


Up To S(no)w Good

by cuddlydreamsonrainydays



Series: I solemnly swear... [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Advent Calendar, Angst, But here they KNOW it, Christmas, F/M, Family Issues, Fluff, Hogwarts Seventh Year, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Marauders' Era, Peter is a Little Shit, there's like really a lot of Christmas, wolfstar
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-01
Updated: 2015-12-25
Packaged: 2018-05-01 03:56:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 25
Words: 35,920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5191298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cuddlydreamsonrainydays/pseuds/cuddlydreamsonrainydays
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>May I tell you about that time where on Christmas, nobody could call it "family time" anymore?<br/>May I tell you about that time where candles didn't shine, they burned, and where the snow's glitter hurt?<br/>And may I tell you about a group of friends that are just trying to find themselves, each other and the Christmas spirit in the mess that is the wizarding world in 1977?</p>
<p>Advent calendar, one chapter each day, length varying.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 1st of December

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to this little Christmas story! I hope you enjoy:)

"You wouldn't say it's Christmas, with the lot of homework they are giving us," James Potter sighed. He readjusted his glasses which had been dangerously close to falling off, and loosened his red and golden tie. Remus Lupin, who left Professor McGonagall's classroom right after him, looked at the loosened tie with raised eyebrows. 

"Technically it's not even Christmas, James. There's three weeks left until the holidays, and we have important exams to pass!" 

"It's officially December first, Moony," Sirius Black protested loudly. "And are you two coming or what? Peter and I are waiting for you! Better hurry up, Prongs, or else Professor McGonagall will know how scared you are of her..." He laughed at James' deadly regard.

"December first doesn't mean Christmas," Remus murmured, but nobody was listening to him anymore. James was too busy fleeing from Professor McGonagall, who had to be leaving her classroom soon, and Sirius was too busy laughing at him, and Peter was Peter, staring dully at the two that lead their group with ease. Peter didn't count; ever since the beginning of the school year he had been acting off, and not only in his normal slightly stupid dullness. He had been a little slow before, rather chubby (you could say fat, also, but first point, Remus was a good person, and second point, in some way they were friends, after all) and his hair of a nasty, greasy blond, but there was now a new sharp edge to the boy. So Remus just quickly caught up with the others and forgot about it. The castle and Hogwarts staff (probably mainly Albus Dumbledore, recently headmaster, genius but a bit strange) seemed to agree with James and Sirius. There were Christmas decorations absolutely everywhere. All the hallways were practically covered in candles and glittery stuff.

"I'm starving, man," James complained dramatically, rubbing his stomach.

"You're literally heading to dinner, drama queen Potter," Lily Evans, coming from behind, scoffed. "I doubt that you will die of hunger in five minutes."

James turned around abruptly. "You'll never know, Evans. I'm a growing man."

"You've got a long way to go with that growing," Lily replied, snorting. She adjusted her heavy school bag on her shoulder and turned to Remus. "Have you finished your essay for Potions already, Remus? I'm not sure about-"

"Sorry, Evans, no school talk after six pm," Sirius interrupted her and slung his arms around Remus shoulders, pulling him along. Remus shot Lily an apologizing look at Sirius' place, but he didn't have the willpower to deny Sirius what he wanted. With his werewolf muscles, he surely would have been strong enough to resist to Sirius' pulling, even though the other preferred Quidditch to studying and that showed, but something about Sirius' arm around his shoulders always made him go weak. "You really behave like a kid sometimes." Sirius grinned at him, but didn't loosen his grip, and Remus didn't really feel like complaining. The taller boy smelled like fir trees and freedom and carelessness, and Remus forgot all reason. They entered the Great Hall and found their place at the Gryffindor table, which was, naturally, also decorated with Christmas stuff, especially in red and golden colours, while the Slytherin table sported a lot more green and silver ornaments. Remus sat down next to Sirius, and Lily sat down next to him, which was quite a surprise as she was now almost facing James. The act could've been initiated by Marlene McKinnon though, who was sitting next to James and thus able to talk Quidditch with him and Sirius. Marlene was Lily's best friend and the reason for that Lily had started tolerating the Marauders at the beginning of their seventh year, finally. Marlene also had this massive crush on Sirius that literally everyone knew about, including Sirius himself, but Remus knew that Sirius wasn't at all attracted to her. In fact, she knew it just as well, but she didn't give up nevertheless.

James had stopped asking Lily on dates at the beginning of their seventh year. A lot had changed generally. A war had started, and they were growing up. Sirius had no family, and neither did Remus; their family was Hogwarts, and sometimes, there was just something missing. How do you bear with parents who can't bear with you?

"Moony, stop thinking!" James pushed his shoulder and grinned, all while stuffing his face with sausages and potato mash. Remus flinched a bit, but he managed to pull himself out of his thoughts. When he looked up, he realized that Sirius and Peter were both staring at him, Sirius with half a smile and Peter with an unreadable expression. What the heck was up with that boy?

"Eat something," Sirius murmured. Remus looked down at his plate and realized that it was empty. He also realized how hungry he was. Smiling gratefully at his friend, he loaded his plate with food and started to eat. The Great Hall was filled with delighted chatter and laughing, and Remus started to feel how the tension left him and he was able to relax.

"Look, there's snow!" a first year exclaimed suddenly, pointing to the enchanted ceiling.

"We can do a snowball fight!" James shouted happily and stood up, still holding some gingerbread in his left hand. The entire Great Hall (except maybe the Slytherins - Severus Snape especially was making a rather sour face) broke into laughter, but Dumbledore calmed them down quickly, just by clearing his throat, before anyone else could prepare themselves to run outside.

"I guess, Mr. Potter, that it is already a little late for a snowball fight outside, don't you think so?"

"But, Professor... It's Christmas!"

Remus saw Sirius rolling his eyes and smiled, tapping the other one's foot slightly with his own. Sirius smiled back and winked. Remus all but blushed - and anyway, he was like PMS-ing with the full moon in five days, and had absolutely no control about his emotions!

"I do fully agree, Mr. Potter, as you can see," Dumbledore responded, pointing to his head where, instead of his normal plain black had, he had put a Christmas bonnet. "Nevertheless, I'm am responsable of my students safety and can't afford losing some of you in the dark - can you imagine all the Howlers I would get? The snowball fight shall take place tomorrow at nine o'clock sharp. Morning classes are exceptionally cancelled - in case that there will be enough snow, naturally."

James cheered loudly, and all of the other student's with him. Even Remus couldn't help being a little happy (though he was worried about exams) and he could see Lily rolling her eyes at James, who had now finally sat down, but not really meaning it anymore.

Maybe Remus was feeling a bit Christmas-y after all, and surely when after dinner, while they were all sitting around the fireplace in the common room, Sirius slung his arm around Remus shoulder once again and murmured, just for him to hear:

"Don't worry, Moony, the full moon will be over soon, and we're with you."

Remus smiled and breathed in the other's scent, happily, while Sirius continued to discuss with their friends and not-so-openly-friends (aka Lily) until one after the other went up into the dormitory to go to sleep. The castle was calm and peaceful when Remus finally fell asleep.


	2. 2nd of December

"Wake up! Everyone wake up!"

James was almost jumping up and down, bursting with excitement like a five year old boy and beaming. The other three boys in the dormitory raised their heads slowly, groggily. Sirius groaned when he spotted his friend.

"Prongs! By Merlin, can't you at least have the decency to put on some clothes?"

"Don't look at me, Padfoot, look outside! There's at least a meter of snow! We have to prepare us for the fight, we need a tactic to defeat Dumbledore!" James was still dancing around, the towel around his hips already hanging dangerously low and revealing more than any of them cared to see.

"How old are you again?" Remus asked, amused. James stuck his tongue out at him and proceeded to dance until the inevitable happened and the towel fell. Remus sighed and quickly looked away before anyone could see the blush that was once again creeping on his face (Merlin, it wasn't like this was the first time that he had seen James naked, the boy had absolutely no shame), while Peter shrieked. Sirius just sighed.

"Okay, we'll all calm down now. James, put some clothes on, you'll make Peter wet his pants. We're coming."

And they were indeed. Barely ten minutes later, the Marauders walked into the Entrance Hall. James was still jumping up and down, now fully clothed in his free time clothes, still bursting with excitement, while the other three were barely awake. Nobody of them saw Professor McGonagall approaching until she was directly in front of them. She cleared her throat to catch their attention, and James stopped jumping up and down immediately.

(About time, if you asked anyone present. The guy was freaking seventeen!)

"Mr. Potter, the Headmaster wishes to talk to you. He asks you to come to his office immediately, it is urgent," she announced briskly. James' smile faded.

"What is up, Professor? Have I done anything?"

Sure, the Marauders were always up to no good, but this time, James couldn't think of anything they might have done except for the incident during dinner, where Dumbledore hadn't seemed angry. Professor McGonagall wasn't smiling (which wasn't unusual) but her regard wasn't strict neither. She waved him off.

"I'm not in the position to tell you, Mr. Potter."

James, worried, shrugged and threw a glance at his friends, telling them not to worry. He left them in the Entrance Hall and walked off direction Dumbledore's office with quick steps. The other three entered the Great Hall and sat down at the Gryffindor table, which was still just as decorated as in the evening. The tables were a lot less packed with students, though - they were still early, it wasn't even eight. While Gryffindor and Hufflepuff students were already represented by a number of students, Slytherin table was entirely deserted and the Ravenclaws were starting to file in.

"You aren't eating, Moony?" Sirius asked, waving his hand in front of Remus' face. His plate was indeed empty. Just as his stomach, he noticed now as Sirius had pointed it out, and so he loaded it with food, despite his worries. The atmosphere in the Hall was tense. Remus didn't like it; his animal instincts made him want to flee. Peter was stuffing his face as usually, apparently without any worries, but he was paler than normally. Remus was once again distracted by Sirius who tore him out of his thoughts.

"Eat, Moony. Food. Food. Food."

His voice had become louder and louder with every repetition of the inspirational word food, until Remus finally looked up.

"By Merlin, Padfoot! I was thinking!" But to reassure his friend, he started to eat nevertheless.

James at this time didn't have to deal with the strange atmosphere in the Great Hall. He was standing in front of the Gargoyles that guarded Dumbledores office and hesitating to knock, even if he couldn't put a finger on the thing that made him feel afraid. Perhaps it had been the look in his teacher's eye, or it was the way the Gargoyles were staring at him. James shook his head. Whatever it was, it was stupid, and so he knocked. The door opened barely a second later, the heavy stone wall sliding to the sides with a rumble. James sprinted up the round stairs as fast as he could. When he arrived at the top, out of breath from the effort, he found the door already opened and Dumbledore awaiting him at his desk.

"James," the man greeted. He didn't smile. The uneasy feeling in James' stomach grew stronger.

"Good morning, Professor. Why did you ask for me?"

"Sit down, James. Are you hungry? Do you want some lemon drops? I can't tell why I keep eating them, but that's probably because it's the only thing eatable that I've got up here. My grandmother sends me a packet of them and some fine socks every year for Christmas." James stared unbelievingly at the Headmaster while he sat down in the cushioned chair. He had always known that Dumbledore was crazy, and it had been confirmed when he (he, James Potter, Marauder with pride!) had been chosen to be Headboy at the beginning of seventh year. This, though; this exceled all craziness of Albus Dumbledore that he had already witnessed.

"That is... interesting, Professor, but I believe I didn't come here to eat lemon drops," he pointed out. Dumbledore still didn't smile, he just opened at box of lemon drops and pushed it towards James' side of the table. He adjusted his glasses. He put a stack of parchment aside. He readjusted his glasses, not looking James in the eyes.

"I know, James," he sighed finally. "Excuse me, please.

James said nothing. He simply proceeded to stare at the Headmaster with furrowed brows and fear in his eyes. Dumbledore cleared his throat and finally started to talk.

"You know that the times are getting darker and darker, James, and while I like to say that there can be happiness found in even the darkest times, the times are still dark. There was a battle last night. The Death Eaters surprised the Order. Someone must have betrayed us. When I arrived, they had the situation almost under control." He paused.

"Just tell me," pleaded James. "Just tell me that they died as heroes, and all that bullshit that is supposed to comfort me! Just freaking tell me by Merlin I am seventeen, I can take it! I can take it without the lies! I know that they fought and that the victory of the good was their highest priority and that they will be remembered in honour! Why don't you just tell me?" He was in rage, or at least he tried to be, but it proved to be hard to be furious with tears shining in his eyes and the deep pain that he felt.

"James," said Dumbledore softly. "I know that you are seventeen, but we always stay our parents' child in some way. I know that this hurts, even if you won't admit it, and if you don't want me to comfort you, I assure you that I won't."

"They can't be dead!" James shouted. He hadn't seen them in a year, and now he would never see them again. He wouldn't go home for Chritsmas - he still could, with Sirius and the house elves, it wasn't as if he hadn't spent all summer at home without his parents, but it wouldn't be the same, knowing that they were dead.

"I'm sorry, James. There are still no lessons today - if you feel the need not to attend them tomorrow, neither, then nobody will force you. I shall have a talk with your teachers about the matter." Dumbledore's eyes still tried to be comforting, but James didn't hear or see any of that.

"They can't be dead," he sobbed, stood up as if stroke by lightning and stormed out of the office, up to the Gryffindor towers. He noticed not one of all the people that he passed by, not one of their strange looks as they saw him crying. Even the Fat Lady seemed to know what was up (usually, the portraits knew all the gossip) and let him pass without the password. He had headed to the dormitory without thinking, but standing in there, he realized that he couldn't stay. Talking to his friends and letting them see his pain and weakness seemed to be impossible in the moment.

Through his tears, he spotted the Marauder's Map on his bed, grabbed it along with his cloak of invisibility and ran. The Fat Lady let him pass, and the people outside where still staring at him without him noticing. He had absolutely no idea where he was going, but the most important thing was to flee.

He finally stopped running in a corridor that he barely recognized when his lungs were aching and his legs were on fire. Coughs and sobs escaped him in a pathetic mix. Over the sound, he heard voices approaching. It wasn’t an option to stay in a corridor, even with the cloak the dangled from his wrist, he couldn’t hide the noises that were escaping him in a constant stream.

All of a sudden, a door appeared on his left without the slightest warning. He slid in without thinking and found a room that was loaded with pillows and punching bags, which was a very strange combination. Looking at the Marauder’s Map, his own point had disappeared, but James was to shaken to contemplate the mystery any further. He urged towards the punching bags and hit them like he would hit his most hated enemy, until he collapsed on the pillows and fell into an uneasy sleep.

Meanwhile, the other Marauders were outside, prepared for the snowball fight. They didn’t pay attention to the happenings, though.  
“Where is James?” Sirius asked aloud, obviously worried. He looked around, being taller than the other students he was able to observe the grounds, but nevertheless he didn’t spot his best friend. Remus furrowed his brows.

“I swear that I’ve seen Dumbledore five minutes ago. James would never miss this out of his free will. Maybe we should go looking for him?”

“We will.” Sirius eyes, normally of a calm, stone-like grey, were now stormy as he nodded with a grim expression. They headed up to the dormitory, but couldn’t find James there. He wasn’t in the common room either, nor in the Great Hall where they checked next.

“I have a feeling that Dumbledore talked to him about something really bad,” Sirius muttered. “I hope he’s not doing anything crazy.” He reached for Remus’ hand, holding it tight for a moment, and let go seconds after, but the werewolf’s hand continued to tingle as if he’d been hit by a tickling charm.

James, meanwhile, turned over in the strange room that had appeared to him, sweating and crying in his light sleep that didn’t bring him any comfort.


	3. 3rd of December

When Sirius woke up on Thursday morning, long before he had to, he didn’t know for a moment what had woken him up. Disorientated, he stared into the darkness. The only light in the room came from the almost full moon – and from Peter’s bed. James’s curtains were open, and his bed empty, but why was Peter awake?

“Peter?” Sirius whispered. “Why are you awake?”

Peter didn’t answer for a good minute, and then, a shaky hand pulled his four-poster’s curtains aside and Peter’s pale, round face appeared. He look a little panicked and his eyes were even littler then usually.

“I… nothing.”

His voice was too high-pitched and he was still shaking. Sirius didn’t believe him. Normally, Peter slept like a stone.

“The truth, Pete.”

“I… okay, I got a letter yesterday in the evening and it’s from my – my parents, and I’ve got to home today, I’m just packing a few things for a long weekend. Don’t worry,” Peter finally answered. He tried to half-smile, but he was just too bad an actor. Sirius was tired, and he was already a straight-forward person normally, so in the middle of the night, there wasn’t an ounce of anything between his thoughts and his mouth.

“If you say so,” he answered sceptically. “You know it’s full moon this weekend, right? If you’re scared, just tell us, Remus wouldn’t force you.”

“I’m not scared! I’m really sorry…” Peter’s expression was now pained, and Sirius sighed. He automatically tried to stylishly mess up his hair with his right hand, stressed as he was, but naturally, that didn’t work in the middle of the night.

“I guess that can’t be changed, then. Good stay at home.”

“Thanks, Sirius.”

Sirius closed his curtains and lay back down, but he couldn’t fall asleep. A few minutes later, he heard Peter’s quiet footsteps and then the door of the dormitory that was opened and closed. He turned over in his bed. The Marauders seemed to be falling apart – first, James had run off instead of talking to them about what was making him this upset, and now Peter had run off for the one weekend the most where Moony needed his friends.

“Padfoot?” A voice whispered suddenly in the dark.

“Moony,” Sirius muttered.

“It’s just us two now, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it’s just us two. Are you okay?”

“I can feel the moon already,” Remus whispered. Sirius could hear, from more than six years of experience, that his friend was holding back emotions. Already when Remus did admit that he was in pain, it was bad.

“Do you want me to…”

“Hm?”

“Do you want me to sleep next to you?” Sirius offered, hesitantly. He needed someone’s comfort himself, which he’d never admit, and maybe he was starting to understand James after all.

“…Yes, please.”

Sirius took a deep, shaky breath in the dark and then pulled his curtains aside to climb out of his own bed. He heard his the sound of his naked feet on the floor while he took the few steps over to Remus’ bed, and Remus ruffling around, but apart from that, there was only silence.

He lay down in his friends’ bed, and immediately was calmed by Remus’ scent and his overwhelming warmth.

“Thanks,” Remus muttered.

“There’s nothing to thank me for, Moony. Good night.”

“Good night, Padfoot.”


	4. 4th of December

The entire Thursday had come and gone without as much as a trace of James or a word of Peter. Remus and Sirius had been practically attached by the hip, but neither laughing like Sirius normally would’ve liked them to, nor talking or studying like it would’ve been Remus’s idea, just finding comfort in each other’s company. Lily and Marlene had been with them for the meals, almost naturally now, but Lily hadn’t stopped looking around and fidgeting a bit more than usually. James’ place in the middle of their group had stayed empty.

Friday morning after breakfast, where neither Sirius nor Remus had really eaten out of worry because James was still nowhere to be seen, they stood in the Entrance Hall for a moment, unsure what to do.

“Shall we go search James and ditch Professor Sprout?” Sirius asked, biting his lips.

“Me?”

“James!”

And there he was indeed, standing right behind them, in dirty, messed up clothes and with deep, dark shadows under his eyes. He was trembling. Sirius urged forward and slung his arms around his best friend’s shaky body, Remus followed just behind.

“Oh my god I’m so glad you’re alive.”

“I’m sorry guys, I’m sorry that I made you worry,” James sobbed. “I’m so sorry.”

“There’s nothing to be sorry about,” Remus said. He was half laughing with relief. “Let’s go upstairs, no offense, Prongs, but you could use a shower.”

“Food,” James moaned. “I need food. And a shower. And then…”

“You owe us nothing,” Sirius said quickly. “But you can tell us everything. We won’t judge, promise. And I’ll get you food in the kitchen, you two can head to the dormitory already. We don’t want to have the Slytherins staring, do we?”

James smiled and nodded, pulling the cloak of invisibility over his head once again. The two of them climbed up the stairs and Sirius, smiling widely and suddenly feeling a lot lighter, made his way to the kitchen. The house elves were always willing to give him some extra food.

James had woken up that morning, hungry and worn out from all the crying, screaming and punching everything he could find in the mysterious room. He could literally feel the bags under his eyes and the greasiness of his unwashed hair. He rubbed his eyes, where he had no tears left, and started to get up slowly. He fell two times before he managed to stand despite his spinning hat (this was worse than the worst hangover he’d ever had, and for the age of seventeen, he’d already had his fair share), and even then he needed to grab something to not fall right back down on the ground again. His throat was sore, but he’d come to reason again.

He couldn’t run away for ever.

So he had made a try to get himself together, pulled the cloak over his head and left the room. When he turned around, the door had vanished. Luckily, he had found Sirius and Remus in the Entrance Hall, standing there with worry obvious on her faces, and now he was able to lean on Remus as they climbed up the stairs. He just needed some food, a nice, long, hot shower and to talk to his friends, and everything would be better.

The Fat Lady raised her eyebrow questioningly when he climbed through the portrait hole, but she had seen a lot in her “life” as the guardian portrait of the Gryffindor common room, and knew better than to ask. Remus went straight up to the dormitory, where James collapsed on his bed, still covered by the cloak, which lead to the strange view that only his feet were visible. Remus sighed and pulled the cloak off.

“Shower or food?”

James looked around, realizing that whatever he chose, he’d have to wait for food, and got up.

“Shower, I guess.”

Remus nodded.

“Thank you,” James muttered. “For not asking. I’ll explain, I promise, but I don’t feel very alive right now, so…”

“You go shower,” Remus interrupted him quickly. “There’ll be enough time for talking.”

So James got up and disappeared into the bathroom. Remus lay down on his bed, closing his eyes. He was pale enough himself, and the shadows under his eyes couldn’t be missed anymore. His bones were aching already, but he was good at hiding the pain (except for with Sirius, who seemed to break down every bit of pride Remus had) and he was good at pushing it aside in his mind. He was floating off to sleep, struck by the constant tiredness that accompanied him the week around this time of the month, when the dormitory’s door burst open and Sirius barked in. He was holding a load of food in his arms and grinning widely.

“Where’s James?”

“Bathroom…”

“You okay?” His tone was more worried within an instant. He put the food down on James’ bed and sat down on next to Remus.

“Just tired, s’all.”

Luckily, James chose this moment to return to the dormitory. He stumbled to his wardrobe, pulled on some clothes (the other two discreetly looked to the other corner of the room) and practically fell down onto his bed.

“Thanks, Sirius,” he mumbled through a mouth full of food. “Oh my god I feel like I haven’t eaten in like forever.” Sirius grinned.

“I hope you don’t mind if I help myself to some food? I haven’t really eaten today.”

“Me neither,” Remus added, grabbing a pumpkin pasty. James gestured vaguely at the pile of food on his bed, and the other two helped themselves. When the food was almost all gone, James looked around.

“Where’s Wormtail?”

“Gone for the weekend,” Sirius shrugged. “I don’t really get it, but he’s been weird all year, I don’t know what’s up with him and I don’t really care right now. What’s up with you, Prongs?”

“It’s my parents,” James answered, suddenly quiet, looking down at his hands. “They’re dead.”


	5. 5th of December

Remus had known that this would be the worst transition he’d ever had already a week ago. The situation had only worsened, now that Peter wasn’t there and James wasn’t at his best neither. Sirius did his best to make up for everyone, but Remus could see and he could feel that the other was almost at the limit of his capacities. Now, they had managed to get into the Shrieking Shack with a lot of difficulties.

James was already transformed, and resting a bit on the floor to get some strength. Even in his stag form he looked smaller than normally. Sirius meanwhile kept Remus company. He sat next to the sweating boy, talking to him with words that formed just a big mess of pain and Sirius’ voice in Remus head, occasionally hoping for an answer or a laugh at one of his jokes, but Remus just wasn’t able to react anymore. He only enjoyed not being alone while he felt the monster inside of himself getting stronger and stronger and fighting to break out.

“Anyway, I really think-“

Remus could feel it suddenly being stronger than him, the wild animal cornering his human instincts somewhere deep in his subconscious, he could feel the immense pain in his limbs and then just everywhere and the last thing he saw with his own eyes was Sirius’ knowing, calm face, before all he knew was that he was hungry and thirsty and didn’t know where to put his force anymore. His only instinct was to attack.

There was a stag on the ground next to him, alert, but he couldn’t smell fear. The wolf growled. Why didn’t that stag fear him, the smartest, and the most powerful of all creatures? He urged forward to attack that insolent stag, when there was suddenly a big, black dog between them.

The wolf stopped and sniffed. This dog didn’t fear him, neither. This dog didn’t even move, he just stood there and stared at him, and for some reason, it made him stop attacking. The wolf felt something stirring deep inside of him, and whatever it was, it hurt. He howled and tried to attack, but something held him back. He tried again and tried again, but he just wasn’t able to attack that dog.

The stag behind the dog made a noise and pushed forward, slowly moving in around him, and then starting to move around the wolf, as if he wouldn’t notice that! What a fool. He would make him pay!

The wolf urged forward, craving to get his claws into something alive, even if it was just an animal, and something in his memories, a distinct, grey, fog, told him that the craving had never been this intense, and that what he craved was human. Animals were just a side effect, but his desires overrode his preferences, and any creature with a pumping heart and warm blood in its veins.

But the dog was faster, moving between them like a breeze of wind, and stopping him from attacking once more. He stared with deep brown eyes. The manoeuvre repeated itself, and repeated itself, and the wolf grew the more and more furious, and finally, he began clawing at his own skin and biting his own flesh in an attempt to still his wants. The dog howled, and jumped forward, and suddenly, there was a dog and black fur everywhere on him and the familiar frustrating smell was just so close.

The wolf resisted, but suddenly, he felt his legs weakening and his limbs tiring, and he fell down, and the thin grey fur on his body disappeared, and the wolf disappeared.

Remus’s human instincts came back slowly while the dog – Sirius – was still on top of him, now pinning him down with his paws. Remus closed his eyes for a moment, exhausted, and overwhelmed. He’d never ever attacked his friends before.

He felt Sirius transforming on top of him, and suddenly, there was a human on top of him instead of a big dog, a human with a ripped t-shirt and arms and Sirius’s face. Remus quickly closed his eyes again, but before, he noticed the angry reddish lines that showed under Sirius’s shirt. The two stayed in the same position for a few long seconds. They forgot completely about James, who cleared his throat loudly.

Sirius flinched and his arms gave in under him. He fell down and Remus felt his weight now heavy on top of him, and his warmth. He quickly closed his eyes to hide the blush on his cheeks, but he figured quickly it didn’t work when he felt the heat that rose on his cheeks. Sirius didn’t seem to look, though.

“You guys okay there?”

“I’m sorry, James, I didn’t mean to attack you,” Remus croaked out. His voice was hoarse and his throat felt like sand. He couldn’t stop thinking about the scars that he had seen all over Sirius’ front. When had that happened, and who had done that? Sirius couldn’t have done that to himself, or could he?

“It’s alright,” James answered lightly. “You okay? I must say, today was pretty freaky.”

“Oh yes, it was,” Remus muttered. Sirius still was on top of him. He hadn’t moved an inch. Remus didn’t mind, not at all – he just wished they could be alone, but he pushed the thought aside as quickly as possible. That was not at all a good thought, not at all.

“I’m pretty worn out,” Remus muttered. Sirius moved.

“Yes, yes, of course,” he stuttered. “I- I’ll get off you, I’m just…” His face was bright red, but he got up and quickly pulled the sweatshirt that he had abandoned before over his head. “Pretty cold, isn’t it?”

The three of them laughed shakily.

“Thanks a lot, guys,” Remus said quietly. “This was the worst time ever, I don’t think that I would’ve made it without you today.”

“The Marauder’s always help each other, Moony,” James said, rolling his eyes. “And now we’re going to sleep, I’m knackered. Good thing it’s Sunday tomorrow.”

“Always,” Sirius repeated, sticking his hand out to Remus to help him up. He then slung his arm around the boy and the two of them slowly made their way out of the Shrieking Shack and through the tunnel back to the Hogwarts grounds behind James.

“Sirius,” Remus whispered when he was sure that James couldn’t hear them whispering anymore. “What are those scars on your chest?”

“Nothing,” Sirius said, too quickly, and stiffened.

“That’s not nothing, Padfoot!”

“But what if I don’t want to talk about it?”

“But what if I want you to talk about it because by Merlin I care about you?”

Sirius defensive façade crumbled. He seemed to shrink in Remus’s arms.

“You can tell me,” Remus encouraged. “No judgements, remember?”

“I will, promise,” Sirius sighed. “But not now. Later.”


	6. 6th of December

It was four in the morning and Remus and Sirius were together in Remus’s bed, talking. They hadn’t slept at all after Remus’s transformation, even though they were so tired that everything seemed calm and slow. James slept in the bed on the opposite site of the room. Occasionally they heard how he turned or snored, but he’d fallen asleep mere seconds after dropping down on his bed.

“It was my father,” Sirius said suddenly, staring up to the dark ceiling. He lifted his shirt, just a little to show the scars across his abdomen and chest. “He’s… kinda… This is not really a new thing, but it has never been as bad as this. You know that I went to live with James’ family during the holidays, but neither of you knew why really.”

“Sirius,” Remus whispered, unable to voice his terror. “I-“

“Sht. It feels good to talk to you about this,” Sirius mumbled. He sat up a little straighter, but he made no effort to untangle their legs. “He used to beat me, nothing too bad, since I can remember. Punishing their children is a common thing amongst pure-blood families, and the Blacks… Anyway, I was used to it and I was used to hiding some minor scars. I even learned to make scars vanish that were made physically, with a belt or a knife.”

Remus had a hard time not talking, or starting to cry – he felt no emotion coming from Sirius, who was speaking in a monotone voice, as if he was talking about someone he barely knew that had been abused all his life, not himself. But he did his best just to listen.

“This summer, something changed. He started drinking even more during the school year, and apparently, I was getting more and more confident in my role as a traitor, so he decided that his punishments weren’t enough for me.”

There was a short break – Sirius took a deep breath, and Remus pulled the boy closer, almost unconsciously, to provide him with support and warmth. He had a bad feeling about what Sirius was going to say.

“When he used the cruciatus-curse for the first time, two days after I had gone home, when I was late for dinner by a minute, I wasn’t even surprised. I had seen it coming, the situation escalating. I knew that this was not possible for an entire summer, so I started to pack my bags to flee. I knew that it would take some time to prepare everything and not have my parents noticing. Meanwhile, they cut off my communication with everyone outside except for people that they had invited. He had used the cruciatus, but not for long, and it wasn’t good, but I wasn’t yet in danger.”

Sirius made another pause, and Remus stayed silent. James snored from the other side of the room – he was still asleep. Remus was wide awake by now.

“Just, he continued to use the cruciatus curse, a whole night once, until I had those cuts all over me that you can see now. That day, I decided to flee. But in my condition, I couldn’t, and so I had to stay another entire four days in my creators’ house. And my father had fun with my helplessness, oh yes, how much fun he had. The second evening, he was drunk, he came into my room and he did what he thought I deserved and what gave him the most pleasure.”

Remus drew a shaky breath. “He hasn’t…”

“Yes. He has. As soon as I was capable to walk, I flew. I stayed a week in some muggle parks and stuff like that until I reached James’s, and the wounds weren’t noticeable anymore.”

Sirius turned in Remus arms. He lay with his back on the other’s chest. His eyes were closed.

“I’m so sorry, Sirius. I’m so sorry. But I’m glad you talked to me, and didn’t keep all of this inside you forever. I’ll forever be there for you.” Remus was at a loss for words – he still didn’t know how to properly phrase what he felt, what he thought, what he wanted to do. He just held Sirius, who suddenly seemed so small, tighter and swore himself to always protect his friend.

“Thank you for listening, Moony,” Sirius answered sleepily. His voice was small. “Can you stay here with me? I think I won’t be able to sleep alone now…”

“Of course. I’d do anything,” Remus said and smiled. And Sirius’s breathing soon became more regular, and calm, as he fell asleep and drifted away from reality. Remus sighed and closed his eyes as well.

“You mean so much to me,” he whispered.

I think I love you, he thought, in his last conscious moment, and before he had had time to overthink, he was asleep, too.

“Guys, guys, look at this!”

James sat in his bed. He was looking at the Marauder’s map in his lap. The tip of his wand was lit – it was still pitch black in the dormitory. He had woken up because he thought that he’d heard something outside, or maybe he’d dreamed something weird – he didn’t actually know. Fact was, he had grabbed the Marauder’s map to look at it, and what he saw amazed him.

“Guys, Lily is in front of this room right now! Guys,” he insisted. When he still got no answer, he looked up suspiciously for the first time. Why didn’t they react? This was possibly the most important moment of his entire life, and his best friends were missing it. What did Lily do there?

“Padfoot! Moony!” James all but shouted. Remus groggily wanted to turn over in his bed, but something against him, something moving, breathing and warm, didn’t let him. The something, or better someone, groaned. Sirius was in his bed. Again. Not that he minded – just, this time, they weren’t alone. He felt his heart beating faster, but he couldn’t and didn’t want to figure out whether it was because of Sirius’s mere presence or the fear that James could see them.

“What’s up, Prongs?” Sirius groaned. “Someone’s trying to sleep in here, it is Sunday and it’s bloody early by Merlin’s dirty underwear!” He turned now, too. The curtains were still closed – but the curtains of Sirius’s bed were wide open, and it was obvious that he wasn’t there.

Apparently, Sirius could feel Remus fear, or his uncomfortableness, and squeezed his hand slightly. Remus blushed. (Iloveyou.)

“Lily has been outside – wait, are you in Remus’s bed? Oh, I don’t care – Lily has been outside just a few seconds ago! On the other side of this very door!” James rambled. He jumped up and down on his bed, still in a sitting position. “What the hell has Lily got to do here?”

“Yeah, what the hell,” Sirius scoffed and sat up. He was still holding Remus’s hand under the blankets, but he pulled the curtains open with his free hand to look at James. “Why don’t you go looking whether she has played St. Nicholas but left some sort of trap in front of our door, get stuck there and don’t come back so we can sleep in peace?”

James pouted. The sight was ridiculous; a boy in his teens, muscled from Quidditch, with a dark shadow of a beard and only wearing boxer shorts that showed of his abs perfectly – pouting like a five-year-old.

“I’m going to look, anyways. You two are shitty friends.”

“I couldn’t even care less about Snivellus’s shampoo – oh wait, he doesn’t use that,” Sirius countered and pulled the curtains close once again. The light from James’s wand disappeared. The two heard James footsteps when he left the bed, and they heard how he opened the door, and then they heard – nothing. For too long.

“James?” Sirius asked, frowning. “I wasn’t actually serious about you not coming back, you know?”

“What by Merlin is he doing?” Remus muttered after another ten seconds. Sirius shrugged – Remus could feel the movement against his own body.

James staggered back into the room. He stood wordlessly next to Remus’ bed, where Sirius and Remus were still trying to sleep, thank you very much. In his hand he held a parcel which had been wrapped carefully in Christmas paper.

“Lily left that,” he stated as if he didn’t believe himself. “Why would Lily give me a present?”

“It’s Saint Nicholas Day today, maybe because of that,” Remus wondered. “It’s still weird that of all people, Lily is the one giving you a present.”

“What are you waiting for? Open it!” The eagerness in Sirius’s voice was obvious. James hesitated. 

“And what if it is a prank?”

“James.” Remus rolled his eyes. “Lily might not seem to particularly like you, but she wouldn’t do something like that to you. She’s not insensitive.”

So James opened the present, carefully, not destroying the wrapping paper the least bit. It revealed – a book. Sirius scoffed.

“She could have made it a little more obvious that it is from her, no?”

“Shut up, Sirius,” James said absent-mindedly. He was focused on the book’s title, which said “When the Stars stop shining”, and its dark red cover with little white stars and a two lonely figures which seemed to be far away, barely shadows. The book was obviously used; it had been read and reread and under his hands, it seemed to tell stories before he had even opened it.

He retreated to his bed, closing the curtains and muttering Lumos, so that once again the tip of his wand was lit. He could hear Remus and Sirius whispering, but he couldn’t have cared less. Carefully, he opened the book.

On the first page, there were words written beautifully in dark purple ink. 

“Dear James,” they said. “I can’t even guess how horrible you must feel, but when I felt a tiny bit of what I can imagine you feel now, this book gave me comfort and I hope you will like it too. I want you to know that you don’t have to always be strong, and always be brave. A true Gryffindor is proud of his weaknesses, because they are what really makes you strong. Lots of love.”

There was no signature, but he had seen Lily. Lily had written this. Lily had written “Lots of love.” Lily was trying to comfort him. James felt his heart warm and practically burst with something strong that he’d never really felt before. The first thing he wanted to do was talk to Lily, but that’d have to wait – for now, he’d read. He turned the page and found a little drawn lion, which made him smile, a real smile for the first time since he knew of his parents’ death. And then he turned another page, and started to read.

“I watched her sitting all alone,” the first sentence said. “Her” had carefully been crossed out in the same purple ink, and replaced with him. James smiled again.

“I watched her sitting all alone, looking at the stars. Indirectly, she was looking at me, but her gaze was empty and her eyes did not shine, not even the slightest bit when usually they were brighter than every star of the universe. I knew it was my fault. I was meant to watch over her, to protect her – and yet, I hadn’t prevented the catastrophe from happening. I was meant to watch over her happiness, but when my light had flickered, the protection over her and her loved ones had flickered, too. I would do anything and everything to make her happy again.”


	7. 7th of December

“And we’re assembled here in victory! The world will be ours, because we are destined to be great! Pure blood and wizarding tradition are destined to be the masters of the world, and I shall be the master of all. So raise your glasses! We defeated the Order of the Phoenix a first time, and we will defeat them forever! Raise your glasses for the Potters’ deaths!”

The room was dimly lit. The surfaces and walls seemed to glisten with water and the black stone almost reflected the pale, green light that came from a few skulls on the wall with a green source of glimmer inside. In the middle of the room with the high ceiling stood a table made of the same black stone, with benches on both sides and a big armchair at the head. A snakelike man sat on that big, black chair, decorated with faces in agony, and spoke to the men and women around sitting around the table.

The Death Eaters around the table cheered loudly when the Dark Lord had finished his speech. They raised their glasses with euphoric laughter, and nobody minded that Voldemort’s face looked more like that of a snake with every day, and nobody minded his red, burning eyes.  
Peter was amongst them at the long table. He had a plate of half eaten food in front of him and a glass of fire whiskey in his raised right hand. His cheers were drowned in the crowd, but yet he was an equal part of them – honoured, even, for being one of the youngest and a double agent already. It wasn’t like with the Marauders.

There, he was a nobody, the ugly one of the group and the loser whose name you only knew because he was with the other three. They were Prongs, Padfoot and Moony, and he? He was Wormtail. They were sporty like James, good-looking like Sirius or smart like Remus, while he was none of that. He couldn’t do anything the right way, anything but this.

He might be someone who ran along with the others and liked following a powerful leader – but here, running along was valued, and his pure blood was valued even though his family was a family of losers.

So Peter cheered and did not think of James, or of the full moon during the night from Saturday to Sunday. It was Monday, and on Tuesday, he’d be back with the others, inventing a story about his sick mother. As if he cared how she felt, as if he cared that she would undoubtedly die soon.

He needn’t care about his life when he was with his new family.

He’d gained a new life – and it would even be worth giving it for the greater good that the Dark Lord would bring. Peter Pettigrew might not seem brave, or extraordinary, but now, for the first time in his life, he was prepared to do anything and everything.

“All alone, none of you will amount to greatness. Without the purebloods of this world, there wouldn’t be anything but misery and injustice and filth. Muggles need to be erased, and greatness shall take over the world!

Are you prepared?”

Voldemort had started to speak once again, with his cold, yet heated voice that made Peter shiver and grow internally.

“Are you prepared to fight for the greater good?” He made a pause, and his followers cheered with gloomy, maniac eyes.

“Then let us fight in union! Let us fight in union against all the filth that dirties the world! You know who is destined to be in this world! Pure blood is destined to survive, and only the strongest will make it through the fight! We are the strongest! We are destined to amount to greatness and make this world a better place!”

That was the only way. Peter knew it. This man was right. The world was at its lowest, and they were destined to change it. They were destined to make it better. He was. And he was prepared to do anything and everything.


	8. 8th of December

Peter came back on Tuesday.

James was feeling a lot better already, which might or might not be related to the Lily-incident on Saint Nicholas Day. They had talked later that day, James confronting Lily, but first of all thanking her. He’d read almost half of the book by the time they went into the Great Hall for breakfast, and he had to admit that it was amazing.

When, after lunch, Lily had been without a friend for the first time, he had taken his chance. Lily had blushed, which was about the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. She had admitted to not hating him, even more – he hadn’t gone as far as kissing her, but still taken her into his arms, hugging her tightly and breathing in her scent.

They had talked for long that evening, about nothing and anything, until Lily almost fell asleep and James carried her up to her dormitory in his arms, the stares miraculously letting him up. The next morning at breakfast, Lily had blushed hard when she saw him, but she’d let him sit down next to her nevertheless, and take her hand subtly under the table.

You could say, regarding the conditions, James was as happy as just possible.

Peter stood in the dormitory when the other three came back from breakfast. He was pale, and a little out of breath. When he greeted them, his voice shook just that little bit.

“Hey, guys.”

“Peter,” Remus said. He smiled. Remus was always friendly, he’d even smile at his worst enemy and apologize to a spider that he had killed by accident.

“I’m sorry,” Peter muttered. He wasn’t looking at them, rather staring at his feet. His shoes were seemed to be wet, and his jacket was damp. His hair was as greasy as usually. “I know I should’ve been there this weekend, but my mother…”

“Don’t worry,” Remus shrugged. “Family is first, I can understand you.”

Peter nodded slightly, but they couldn’t see whether he was smiling or not because he still kept his head down. James and Sirius kept quiet – they wouldn’t be that nice with the fourth member of their group. The diplomatic talk was Remus’s thing.

“James,” Peter added. “I’m sorry. I should’ve been there.”

James shrugged, turning to his bed. His Transfiguration book had to be put in his bag, and then the ink cartouche and the quill. Then, he answered.

“I’ve been better, that’s right, but there’s been others to help me.” He thought of Lily, and the book that was hidden under his pillow. He’d finished it by now. Lily had said that he could keep it, and he would always treat it like his biggest treasure.

“We should get going,” Sirius called into the awkward silence. He had his back on his shoulder and grabbed Remus’s cloak to get pull the boy with him. “Come on Moony, we don’t want to be late for good old Minerva, do we?”

James hurried to leave the dormitory directly after them. He didn’t want to walk with Peter. The boy was weird at the moment, something about him had changed, and James didn’t like it. In the common room, he almost ran into Lily.

“Sorry,” he said quickly. She smiled.

“No problem. Why are you in such a hurry? Remus and Sirius have just left.” She pointed at the portrait hole that was in the process of closing behind his friends.

“I don’t want to walk with them, they are in some kind of bonding phase at the moment,” James grinned. “I’m running away from Peter. Are you waiting for Marlene?”

“I was waiting for her, but she got held up by some kind of outfit trouble and I was apparently so useless that she kicked me out. She’ll be late for Transfiguration like that,” Lily complained, rolling her eyes. James laughed lightly.

“You could walk with me,” he offered. Lily, although looking surprised, smiled.

“Why not?”

A week ago, she would’ve listed a million reasons why one absolutely could not walk with James Potter. Now, she simply started walking, expecting him to follow (which, obviously, he did) and striking up a conversation about something like the difference she couldn’t see between purple and red tights that seemed to be a matter of life or death to Marlene.

Even though that topic was possibly the next to least interesting in the world (right after the History of Magic classes that Professor Binns held), James found himself laughing, and the strange sensation in his heart growing.


	9. 9th of December

The common room was almost empty at ten in the evening on Wednesday. There were just some second-years in the far corner of the room, apparently doing their homework that was due for the next day. The Marauders (except for Peter, who slept during every spare minute since he’d been back Tuesday), Lily and Marlene had taken the comfiest armchairs around the fireplace.

Lily had her legs across James’s lap on the red velvet couch that they shared, and Marlene was joking with Sirius about Quidditch, who kept exchanging glances with Remus, who was staring at the blistering fire with an absent gaze.

“Say, what’s up with Peter?” Lily asked suddenly. She’d gotten bored of the endless Quidditch conversation, and was eager to change the topic. Sirius furrowed his brows immediately and frowned.

“I have no clue,” he answered. "None of us do. But for sure he’s weird at the moment, won’t even look at us directly. When I walked past him in the bathroom this morning he flinched like a scared rabbit!” Nobody laughed. Remus stopped staring at the flames and directed his torso more to the group.

“He says that there’re problems with his mother,” he threw in, chewing on his lower lip. Sirius scoffed.

“I don’t think so, me. Wormtail hasn’t ever told us anything about his parents before, I’ve never even seen them, I don’t think they’re important enough in his life to go home ever few weeks. Also, the teachers would have to know, wouldn’t they? And they never do.”

The five of them were quiet for a moment. The only sound came from the second-years packing up their stuff, the little bell on the big Christmas decoration in the room ringing with a clear sound, and the branches in the fireplace burning to ashes and falling to pieces.

“But what’s up, then? And why’d he lie to us?” James wondered aloud. He messed up his hair with his hand, a gesture of stress, and took off his glasses to rub his forehead. Lily was thinking.

“Maybe he’s afraid,” she suggested. “I don’t really know him, but couldn’t he be ashamed of his family, maybe?”

“More than me?” Sirius laughed humourlessly. “I guess that’s hardly possible.”

“I don’t know,” Marlene said. “I’d say he’s got some kind of secret job already, as it’s our last year, but he’s just too dumb. Who’d hire him, by Merlin?”

Remus sighed deeply. He stared at the flames once again, thinking and somehow not even seeing them. All he could see was Sirius’s face, and then sometimes Peter’s, the new sharpness within his soft features and the strange expression that his face now showed when he thought that nobody was looking.

“No the Daily Prophet, that’s for sure,” James chuckled darkly. “I still doubt that he really knows how to write, by the way.” They all laughed, and the atmosphere changed to something a little brighter.

“Whatever it is,” Lily shrugged. “He’s not able to do big harm, that’s for sure.” She was staring at James, and James was staring at her – literally, they couldn’t have made it any more obvious if they’d tried to. Lily blushed, her cheeks taking the lively colour of her hair and the soft flames in the fireplace.

Remus smiled, and automatically turned his head to glance at Sirius, who, to his surprise, was staring at him. Marlene yawned and stood up.

“I don’t know about you guys, but it’s still Wednesday and we’ve got Potions tomorrow first thing at eight, I’m not very eager to fall asleep,” she told her friends, waved shortly and disappeared up the staircase to the girls’ dormitory.

“Night, Marlene,” Lily called out after her and yawned as well. “You’ve got to keep an eye on Peter, boys,” she muttered. “I don’t know, but I don’t have a good feeling about this.”

James pulled her closer and caressed her head lightly, attempting to comfort her. He pushed a few streaks of her hair out of her forehead with a reassuring smile.

“Don’t worry, Lils, I’m going to look out for you.”

“My name’s not Lils,” was the last thing she mumbled before she fell asleep.

“She seems to make a habit of falling asleep on you, mate,” Sirius commented, laughing. James just smiled fondly.

“You’re just jealous, Padfoot. I’m going to get her upstairs,” he informed his friends without looking at them. Sirius rolled his eyes in James’s back and scoffed slightly.

“I don’t need some girl to fall asleep on me,” he muttered, mostly to himself, but Remus couldn’t help hearing the words. What did Sirius mean by that? Was there a chance that he might feel the same


	10. 10th of December

On Thursday afternoon, when Sirius, James and Marlene were busy with Quidditch practise outside in the biting cold, Remus and Lily sat in the library. They had no longer been studying for several minutes now. Instead of talking about school stuff, they’d been talking about boys. Literally.

First of all, of course, James.

“I knew you never hated him,” Remus stated. He was obviously amused, regarding Lily with a smirk. She rolled her eyes, almost murdering him with her looks, but still smiling.

“I did, at some point,” she answered. “But now… I don’t, yeah, that’s right.”

“Do you think you love him?” Remus asked. He sat up a little straighter, interested.

“I don’t know.” Lily had a dreamy look on her face. She was playing with her quill and drawing little dots, hearts and question marks on her parchment in the purple ink that she’d purchased in Diagon Alley during the summer holidays and that she loved deeply. “Anyway, do you think he loves me?”

“I would’ve said no a few weeks ago.” Remus laughed lightly, closing the book in front of him. It made no sense to pretend that anything of what was written in “The Goblin Wars – A History” would get into his head today. “But something’s changed last week, when his parents died, I think he’s got a little more maturity now… Yes, I think. Yes, he loves you. He’s always thought that he loved you already – he’s surely never loved anyone else – but now, he really does. It’s obvious, I can see it in his face.”

“You talk about love like an old man, Rem,” Lily grinned. “I knew you never wanted one of those girls that have been crushing on you since our first year. It’s Sirius, isn’t it?”

Remus’ first reaction was to shake his head; then, he nodded. A blush crept on his face. Yes, it was Sirius. The matter was starting to get serious, which was a very bad joke. Sirius was starting to make him go crazy.

“Yes,” he muttered. “Yes, I guess. I can’t help it.”

“Well,” Lily said nonchalantly. “I can’t blame you; he’s quite the good-looker. Nothing compared to James, of course.” The last sentence was added quickly, and her cheeks darkened. “Are you planning on telling him?”

Remus bit his lip. Should he? It was so easy for Lily and James; they’d been destined to be together in some way since their first year – being Head Boy and Head Girl now, James growing up and Lily loosening up a bit, they fit like two pieces of a puzzle that had simply needed to find their own form before. But for him and Sirius? They were both fucked up, to be quite frank. Maybe it was too much.

On the other hand… They did find comfort in each other. Or at least, Remus found comfort in Sirius’ presence. And especially during the last weeks, it had seemed to be the same the other way round. But what if he’d been simply imagining?

“Stop worrying,” Lily commanded. “You two are too obvious; he, too, will have to notice at a moment.”

“Yeah… Anyways, you and James… Honestly, with your thing on Saint Nicholas Day you stole us good few hours of sleep,” Remus complained. “It was cute, though, really. I don’t exactly know what that book is, but I know that it has helped him a lot. How did you know that he likes to read? It literally took me three years to find out!”

“Seriously?” Lily’s eyes widened. “I knew from the very first day. When I first met him, he was reading, did you know? A second later, he looked up, insulted me and told me I was – what did he say? – the prettiest eleven year old he’d ever seen, but of course he preferred older girls. That was when I first realized that not everyone who reads is a good person!”

Remus broke into laughter.

“I can’t believe it,” he coughed. “He’s never ever told us that. In his story, it used to be you asking him something and he telling you that he thought your hair was pretty, and you storming off upset. But we haven’t talked about that in years, anyway – Halloween that first year is way more important.”

“Yeah, well,” Lily scoffed. “I’ll never let him forget that, either. He’ll have a freaking toad on his head on his wedding day.”

“You’ll have to wear a green dress…”

“Better than a lavender one!” Lily stared dreamily at the rows of books and shelves, covered in dust and stories of centuries. Suddenly, she slapped Remus’ arm. “And who said that I’ll marry him? We haven’t even gone on a date yet!”

“Yet.”

“You are one to talk, Remus Lupin. There’s your boy, by the way.”

And really, Sirius was just coming through the library’s door. James was trailing behind him. Both of their faces lit up when they saw Remus and Lily sitting at their usual table. Oh, this would get interesting…

None of them had seen a lanky boy with a green striped tie that had been creeping around behind the very shelves that Lily had stared at the entire time…


	11. 11th of December

A little Slytherin boy, probably approached Sirius on Friday morning after they’d had two hours of DADA and tugged innocently at the hem of his cloak when Sirius was too busy talking to Remus to listen. Irritated, the Gryffindor turned around and looked at the small one questioningly, especially examining his tie and silver-green emblem with furrowed eyebrows.

“What’s up?”

“Dumbledore wants to talk to you,” the little one said. “He said that you should come to his office immediately.” He turned and walked away, disappearing around the corner. Sirius’ frown deepened.

“What by Merlin does Dumbledore want from me?” He asked. “I haven’t done anything, that’s for sure!” He’d had other things on his mind, he added silently, while James had gone pale. Remus grabbed his friend’s arm.

“I think you should better go,” he said in Sirius’ direction. “It can’t be that bad, can it?” It wasn’t McGonagall who brought the message this time, he added with his eyes, but didn’t say that aloud. He didn’t want to upset James even more. “We’ll wait for you in the common room, won’t we, guys? We’ve got free period anyway.”

James nodded, and Remus turned to look for Peter, but the smallest of the group wasn’t there.

“Where’d he go? I swear he’s been there just like a few seconds ago!”

“Pete’s become faster,” Sirius laughed. “Anyway, I’ll be off!” And he, too, turned around, walked off with quick, long steps and left the other two standing. He’d disappeared behind a corner in seconds. Dumbledore’s office technically wasn’t far away – he’d have to pass by one staircase and three corridors to get there, which would take him a mere three minutes.

Technically.

Because, when Sirius was walking through the corridor on second floor, the one with barely any doors that thus barely anyone used, something stopped him out of nothing. He was no longer able to move neither his legs nor his arms – he was frozen on spot, and he couldn’t make out a reason why.

It was cold in the corridor. His hands started to get icy cold within a minute, and his breath was visible in front of his mouth. What by Merlin had happened?

Or rather, was happening.

A window opened slowly and with a creak to his left almost out of his field of vision. He could barely see it opening. The dark shadow that he saw climbing inside could have been a mere product of his imagination. But if it was real, if it was a person – who was it? Was this a bad prank?

He tried to move once more, he tried to reach for his wand that was hidden under his cloak in the front pocked of his trousers, and he tried to turn his head, but the more he tried, the less possible it seemed. He was cold.

“But… Who do we have here, huh?”

Bellatrix? Sirius’s eyes widened. This wasn’t good, this wasn’t good at all. Bellatrix Black, his cousin, or rather Lestrange now, as she’d gotten married during summer, wasn’t supposed to be at Hogwarts. She was supposed to be anywhere but here, doing whatever it was that involved black magic and the worshipping of Voldemort. What did she do at Hogwarts?

“My little cousin,” she purred. Sirius was sure now that it was Bellatrix. Knowing didn’t reassure him. “You’ve grown, haven’t you? Too bad that you won’t be needing your looks… And that they won’t be reproduced… Regulus!”

The last word was an order. Sirius could hear a second pair of footsteps behind his immobile body in the corridor. He felt like he was going mad, not being able to see anything, defenceless. His mouth wouldn’t open, words wouldn’t come out.

“What did your owl tell me last night? The little traitor is in love? With a certain… male… werewolf?” Sirius didn’t need to see her face to know that she was rolling her eyes in disgust and shivering dramatically. His heart skipped a beat. By Merlin, how did she know when he hadn’t told anyone, hadn’t even told James yet? How could she know?

“I think it was exactly that, Bella,” his brother mused. His voice sagged from satisfaction. Sirius suddenly felt nauseated, and he vaguely wondered whether he’d be able to vomit while he was under this damned curse. Bellatrix laughed, her maniac laugh that would’ve made Sirius shiver himself. If he could’ve, which he wasn’t the case.

“I think he needs to be punished for that, don’t you, Regulus?”

“Oh, I do think so,” Regulus muttered. There was an angry undertone in his voice that Sirius knew all too well, and his brother seemed to be not only angry, but also hurt. Sirius closed his eyes briefly. Of course Regulus would want to get revenge. His summer holidays must’ve been horrible, even more than already under normal conditions. And he could hear the desire to prove himself to Bellatrix, to be worthy of the life he’d chosen.

The moment that he heard the unforgivable words out of Regulus’ mouth, he knew that he’d now lost his little brother for good. Regulus had taken that damned train without a ticket back. The moment that the curse hit him, a scream left his body, deep and almost unnatural. He hadn’t known before that he was capable of making such sound. He wouldn’t have wanted to know.

It was the worst pain he’d ever felt. He felt like his back was being ripped open and his rips were being crushed and his lungs were being pressed together so that he couldn’t breathe. His eyes turned to the ceiling all alone, he wasn’t able to control them anymore. The curse still held his limbs – without it, he would’ve been lying on the floor by now.

He screamed in pure agony. The two, or maybe more, were firing curses faster than Sirius could even think, or follow what was setting his entire body on fire now. He felt a hot liquid – blood – trickle down his back. And he heard their insults, ringing in his head.

“Bloodtraitor!” Bellatrix hurled.

“Coward,” Regulus hissed.

“Faggot,” Bellatrix added, laughing this time.

And so on. Sirius felt like passing out. He couldn’t difference between reality and his imagination anymore; he thought that he’d seen James for a moment, but he was there, obviously; his father’s face appeared in front of him, laughing maniacally, his coughing laugh mixing with Bellatrix’s hysteric cackle and Sirius wanted it to end.

He couldn’t protect his ears. When he tried closing his eyes, he saw the same images behind his eyelids, if not worse, so he gave up. He gave up – his scream ceased (nobody’d hear him anyway) and he stop trying to fidget, stopped trying to make an effort against the curse (it didn’t help anyway).

“Please,” he whispered, in his last conscious second. “Remus…”

When he’d passed out, Bellatrix and Regulus stopped the curses. Bellatrix let him drop to the floor first, kicking him the helpless boy a few times for the pure satisfaction, the pure dominance. Then, she levitated him, so that he hung in the air like a heavy bag of flour, his face directed at the ground.

A drop of blood fell down every few seconds. Bellatrix stared at her work with satisfaction shining in her eyes.

“We should go,” Regulus pointed out nervously after two minutes of silence. “Dumbledore could feel the desire to take a walk just here any second, and I don’t feel like getting thrown out, to be honest.”

Bellatrix laughed. She made Sirius turn one last time to look at the scars that they’d left on his back, to admire them, and then she laughed maniacally before heading to the window.

“You could be quite right, Regulus. I’ll see you and Peter soon.” And with that, she’d climbed out and flown away. Remus left the scene as quickly as possible, and his uneasy feeling had been right – Dumbledore arrived at the end of the corridor not even five minutes after his depart.

“By Merlin,” he whispered, disbelievingly. “Sirius Black.” He levitated the poor boy himself now, bringing him to the hospital wing with quick steps and a hard expression on his face that not many had seen on his face so far. A few students saw him, and one or two of them recognized Sirius – the word started to spread that Sirius Black, the first of his family in Gryffindor, had been attacked.

While Mme Pomfrey in the hospital wing almost fainted, but then hurried to occupy herself of Sirius’ injuries, Remus’ sensitive dog ears got him alarmed immediately in the common room as he heard a third year mentioning Sirius Black to her friend in a hushed, shocked tone.

“What is with Sirius?” He called through the entire room, not caring about the few people that had free period as well.

“You haven’t heard?” The girl called back. “He’s in the hospital wing! Dumbledore brought him there, he’s-“  
Remus didn’t need to hear more. He jumped out of his armchair, almost knocking over the table with his potions essay spread out over it, and ran out of the common room. Sirius!

James followed him close by. There still was not the slightest trace of Peter. They reached the hospital wing in record time, three minutes later, out of breath. When Remus threw the door open, Dumbledore turned to them in an instant.

“He’ll recover quickly,” the Headmaster assured the two. “Do you have any idea who could have done that to him?”

“Done what?” James asked, but Remus only had eyes for Sirius. He was on his stomach, still out of it, and Mme Pomfrey was pouring a yellow-ish liquid on his back. But the deep, angry red cuts all over it and the bruises where the skin was still intact were clearly visible. Remus swallowed hard.

“Sirius,” he whispered. “No…”

“Do you have any idea who could have done that?” Dumbledore repeated, patiently. He mustered the worried boy, seeming interested – Remus didn’t see, and he couldn’t have cared less.

“No,” he answered, but overthought that quickly. “It must have been some Slytherins… He’s had some family trouble over the summer…” When Mme Pomfrey was finished with her procedure, had put a protecting charm over Sirius back and turned him over, Remus grabbed the unconscious boy’s hand. Dumbledore smiled, but didn’t comment on it.

“I figured,” he said instead. “Well, he can be lucky to have friends like you… I’ll see whether we can find any evidence to punish the responsible. Poppy, send me a notice please when there’s any news, I’ll leave the boys here with Mr. Black.”

“Of course, Albus.” Mme Pomfrey nodded, and Dumbledore left.  
Remus stared at Sirius and sighed. Hadn’t they had enough bad luck already? James on the contrary was angry.

“The Slytherins,” he hissed, “will pay for this. Dearly. I swear to Merlin that this is Regulus’ work, and he will pay.”


	12. 12th of December

Sirius had to stay in the hospital wing for the entire next day. He hadn’t regained conscience when Remus and James had been forced to leave the evening before, and now, at breakfast, there was yet again an empty space at their table. While Remus was staring quietly at his plate and munching on the same piece of toast already since ten minutes, James couldn’t stop staring at the Slytherin table.

Especially at Regulus Black.

And Regulus Black was only too happy to meet his eyes with a smirk. James had to look away in order not to storm over and kill him with his bare hands right there. Carefully, Lily put her hand on the boy’s thigh.

“James,” she muttered. “No.”

“I know.” James sighed. His breathing became more even again, and he stopped seeing red. “Thanks. He’ll pay, though. But not like this…”

In his head, he was already making plans. Remus had overheard the conversation and looked up. Their eyes met. Normally, Remus would’ve tried to convince his friend that revenge really wasn’t the solution, but this time, the only thing James could make out in his eyes was determination.

Remus put his half eaten piece of toast down barely seconds later and stood up.

“I’ll go see Sirius in the hospital wing,” he announced. “Maybe he’s awake by now.”

James stuffed the last bite of his pastry into his mouth and stood up as well.

“I’ll come with you.”

He didn’t see Lily rolling her eyes behind his back. The two took off, heading up the stairs to the hospital wing and Remus opened the door carefully. He needn’t have bothered. Sirius was wide awake, lying in his bed with open eyes and spotting them immediately. He smiled.

“Guys.”

“Padfoot!” James called. “Oh thank Merlin you’re awake. Who has done that to you? I swear they will pay, they will pay so dearly!” He ran over to his best mate’s bed, furious. Sirius smiled weakly.

“Sirius,” Remus said, much more quiet than James and with a lot more things left unspoken behind the simple name. “How are you feeling?” He sat down on the edge of Sirius’ bed, observing him attentively.

“As some trolls had been playing that weird Muggle game with me, the thing where you kick the ball,” Sirius said, dryly. He let out a short laugh, which soon turned into a cough. “But I’ll live. Mme Pomfrey’s done a rather good job, as always. I don’t feel my back anymore.”

“Is… that a good or a bad thing?” Remus furrowed his eyebrows, trying to determinate Sirius’ real feelings underneath the usual façade of jokes.

“I suppose it is a good thing,” Sirius moaned. “I’d be in quite a bit of pain if I’d feel it, I guess…”

“Who has done that?” James repeated. His hands still formed fists from his rage, and he, unlike Remus, wasn’t able to sit still, walking around restlessly in front of Sirius’ bed.

“Bellatrix,” Sirius answered. His voice still didn’t give away his feelings. “And Regulus.”

“I knew it!” James all but cried. “I’ll make him pay!” He looked at his watch, and bit his lip. “I’ll have to go, I’m so sorry, I’ll stop by later and tell you my plan.” And with that, he was already out of the room.

“What plan?” Sirius asked, shaking his head amusedly, but he couldn’t fake happiness for long.

“How are you feeling, Sirius?” Remus asked, quietly. “Really. And why have they done that?” He reached out for Sirius’ hand, almost automatically, and blushed when he realized what he was doing, but Sirius held his hand tight.

“Pretty crappy, to be honest,” he admitted. “He’s supposed to be my brother after all, and they didn’t even give me the possibility to defend me.” He shiver when he thought about what happened, but he needed to tell someone. Oh, who was he kidding? He needed to tell Remus.

“They put me under some curse, so that I was unable to move, and they let me rest in the middle of the corridor in the freezing cold for a few minutes at first, before firing curses at my back, never showing themselves while I couldn’t turn my head to make me go mad. They… they called me names.”

He paused, and Remus tightened the grip on his hand even more.

“What... kind of… names did they call you?”

“I… need to tell you something,” Sirius whispered, staring at their linked hands. “And I hope you won’t run away from me. It would be unfortunate, I’m not really able to run after you, so…”

He laughed nervously.

“Remus Lupin, I think… I might love you.”

Remus stared at the boy in sheer disbelief. Had he heard right? It wasn’t like he hadn’t hoped that Sirius might feel the same, hadn’t seen some signs already – but despite all that, he’d never expected this to really happen.

“Sirius,” he whispered. “I might love you, too.” And with that, he moved his head down, giving Sirius a slight peck on the lips, soft and teasing. Sirius tasted like wildness and forest, while Remus tasted like chocolate and warmth, and even like this, their lips were a perfect match.

“Wow,” Sirius breathed. Remus smiled.

“You can’t imagine for how long I’ve been dreaming about his,” he mumbled.

“I think I can,” Sirius responded, having forgotten about the pain he felt. “Won’t you give me another kiss?”

“When you’re healthy again,” Remus grinned. His heart fluttered. It seemed to burst with love – he could’ve hugged the entire world. Sirius pouted.

“Not fair!”

“Life’s not always fair…”

“At least stay with me.”

“As if I’d planned on leaving you any time soon. You won’t get rid of me that easily,” Remus chuckled. Sirius grabbed his other hand, too.

“Good. You better stay, because I planned for this to last an eternity and longer.”


	13. 13th of December

Sirius was allowed to leave the Hospital Wing just in time for lunch on Sunday. Christmas was only eleven days away, and the people were getting incredibly excited everywhere. Nobody really talked about Sirius in the Hospital Wing, and he was very glad about that. Everyone’s minds were just already too focused on going home, apparently, in February or something like that, this would’ve been a different story.

Anyway, when Sirius came down to the Great Hall, the Marauders were already eating. Even Peter had went to see Sirius in the Hospital Wing once. That had been a very weird five minutes, but Sirius didn’t have to focus on Peter as he could focus on Remus instead.

His gorgeous, amazing, finally boyfriend that made his heart beat faster from excitement every time he saw him, sprung up from his place at the Gryffindor table the very second he noticed Sirius coming towards them, still walking a bit more slowly than normally, but despite that okay.

“Sirius,” he muttered in relief when Sirius had reached them. They hadn’t decided on making anything official yet, so they simply shared a brief hug before Sirius sat down. Under the table, Sirius grabbed Remus hand.

“Mate!” James cheered. “You’ve got to have some of this amazing gingerbread cake!” Sirius grinned, helping himself to what James had proposed.

“I’m so glad you’re back,” Remus said lightly. “It was really hard to keep James somewhat reasonable, even with Lily’s help.”

Lily rolled her eyes, glaring at James. The boy suddenly seemed to be very focused on his food, helping himself to another serving of some pie and cutting it into pieces of exactly the same size each, not looking up.

“You sure you were successful with that?” Sirius teased. Before neither Lily nor Remus could answer, hell broke loose.

There were loud shouts and a few high-pitched screams coming from the Slytherin table that echoed through the hall. Everyone turned to them, and some shrieked along, thinking that there must be something horrible when an entire table started panicking. First, they couldn’t see anything. Then, you saw some Slytherins spitting out there food hurriedly, amongst them Regulus Black, with wide, teary eyes.

Remus, Sirius and Lily were the only ones that didn’t have to watch the spectacle to know what was going on. They, instead, looked at James, who was grinning widely.

“I love being friends with the house elves,” was the only comment he made. “Just wait!”

“What by Merlin have you done, Potter?” Lily was extremely angry, now really glaring at James. He shrunk a little in his seat. Remus watched them amusedly.

“I wanted revenge!” James tried to defend himself. “This is nothing compared to what they’ve done to Sirius, they won’t die because there might be a bit too much chili in their food…”

Lily was breathing hard. If she was a dragon, there’d be coming fire out of her nose, and her eyes were no longer a soft green, but a piercing, deadly, Avada-Kedavra-like green. Before he could continue her speech, though, something else happened at the Slytherin table.

Regulus suddenly broke out in spots, and not those little ones that everyone gets, but big, bright red, pus-filled ones, and from the way he was squirming, they weren’t only in his face. Now, the Slytherins that had already recovered from the burning in their mouths, started to laugh at him, and Regulus, surely bright red (underneath the spots, too) left the table as quickly as possible and limped out of the hall, followed by roaring laughter.

While the teachers didn’t seem very concerned (multiple students would swear later on that Dumbledore had been laughing, and even Professor McGonagall had cracked a smile), Lily was angry for four.

“James Potter!” Lily roared. “When will you learn that revenge isn’t always the solution? This will be never-ending if you always-“

And then, obviously frightened by her sentence, James shut her up. Literally. He put his hands in her hair over the table, forcing her to move her face towards him while he was moving towards her, and kissed her.

James Potter, finally kissing Lily Evans.

The entire Great Hall went silent, so silent that you could've heard a needle dropping.

And Lily did not move away. The situation looked everything but comfortable, while they were sitting on the opposite sides of the table, platters of dessert still in between them, but they were kissing, for Merlin’s sake, and everything everyone in the hall could think was “finally”. Yes, including Lily.

When they finally broke apart, both sitting down on their place again, both with bright red faces. The radio silence went on, while Lily had obviously forgotten everything she was saying before. After about a minute of nobody talking (the ghosts had frozen in their spots, and Remus could spot Crabbe at the Slytherin table frozen with his fork halfway to his mouth), Dumbledore took the matter in his own hands.

“Well, congratulations, Mr. Potter, Miss Evans!” He was almost smirking. (Dumbledore didn’t smirk. Dumbledore smiled, and sometimes he chuckled, but he never, ever smirked.)

The students in the hall slowly started eating, talking and laughing again, but the Marauders, and especially Lily and James, still were the main centre of interest. Nobody of the group talked, until James cleared his throat.

“Uh… Lily… Can I talk to you for a moment? Outside?” He asked, shyly scratching his head and looking at Lily pleadingly.  
She only nodded, and the two got up hurriedly to leave the Great Hall. Outside, James took Lily’s hand in his, carefully. She let him do it.

“Lily Evans,” he mumbled. “First of all, I’m sorry that I harassed you during six years. Second, I’m sorry that I thought I’d know who you are, how you feel, and what would be best for you. I have now realized what an idiot I was, and I’m so sorry. But I hope, I really hope, that you can see that I’ve changed.

Lily Evans, I love you.

Lily, will you be my girlfriend?”

He looked at her, his head tilted to the left, with a pleading look in his hazel eyes that were always hidden behind his glasses, and Lily knew that saying no would be a lie, and would only hurt them both more than anything. She smiled at him, seeing the hope growing in his eyes, and his happiness alone was worth it.

“Yes,” she answered softly. “Yes, I will be your girlfriend, James Potter, you insupportable idiot that somehow I’ve come to…” She hesitated. “That somehow I’ve come to love,” she finished, so quietly that it was barely audible.

“I love you,” James repeated overwhelmed. “Merlin, I love you so much.”

And then he kissed her once again, while they were standing right in the middle of the Entrance Hall, Christmas decorations everywhere around them and finally, finally love in the air.


	14. 14th of December

Lily’s heart was pounding when she rushed down the stairs, and she didn’t know if it was because of the early morning effort, the kiss that she had just shared with James right in the middle of the common room, the Arithmancy exam that she was about to pass as her first exam of this entire dreaded week, or the unopened letter she was clutching in her hand.

Thinking about the kiss made her blush, and press her school bag tighter against her body as if to hide behind it. They hadn’t even been together for 24 hours now, but every kiss felt like their lips were just meant to fit together and when he held her in his arms, Lily felt safe, loved and protected.

Too bad James hadn’t chosen Arithmancy as an elective.

Who by Merlin had figured that it would be a great idea to hold an exams’ week right before the holidays? Like, really, who had thought, oh yeah, students will be able to do their best in school and get into holiday spirit at the same time without freaking out?

The thing was, Lily could do school. Lily could do numbers, and potions, and transfiguration, she liked learning and was naturally curious, teachers told her she was talented and from a very early age, she’d been called a bright girl. She knew that. But she also tended to stress, because always being top of her class came with responsibility and expectations.

And sometimes, Lily felt like all of this was growing way over her head. She knew that she could do it – but she also know that once not succeeding would be the moment she’d break. So it wasn’t possible. She needed success to breath, to function.

So even though she knew that she technically could’ve taken this exam already right after summer holidays, during which she’d read half of her new Arithmancy book to get rid of thoughts about her family situation and to seek refuge in her room, she was now panicking. As always.

While James’ tight hug and kiss had definitely helped, giving her some strength, the letter in her hand didn’t help at all. She hadn’t yet opened it, but she already had a bad feeling about what her family could have written. Her name was carefully written, in standard blue ink on the envelope. It wasn’t a parchment envelope; the paper felt weird in her hand and looked way too white.

She didn’t want to open in before the exam. Why would her family send her a letter just five days before she would be coming home anyways? That didn’t sound like them, it wasn’t reasonable enough and for a year already now, they hadn’t had much to say to each other anyways. Her summer holidays, except for the two weeks of them that she had spent at Marlene’s house, had been the most horrible holidays ever.

Petunia despised her. What had started as a little weirdness between them when Lily had finally found out that she really was special, that she really wasn’t like her sister or her parents, was now full-on hate. Her sister was disgusted by magic, and by Lily, and she showed it.

Her parents didn’t want to hear about her doing magic. They wanted to pretend that she was going to a normal boarding school, not doing magic, but “doing something clever that will be of use later in life”, the exact opposite of magical “nonsense”, as they’d call it.

What they didn’t understand was that Lily hadn’t chosen being a witch, but it was her identity, and her life, and in her world, her education at Hogwarts would be valid later. She’d tried to explain that there were wizarding professions, and that her life as a witch wouldn’t end with her graduation from Hogwarts, but her parents just didn’t get it, so they’d grown apart, until finally there was nothing left to talk about.

So when they wrote, what good news could it be?

She reached the room in which the Arithmancy exam would take place barely five minutes early, untypical for her, and sat down at an empty table in the front. Greeting the professor with a smile, she took out her quill and a blank piece of parchment, trying to empty her mind of everything that wasn’t Arithmancy, and waiting.

When the professor passed around the sheets, she dived into the work head first and suppressed every other thought or emotion.

When time was up, and she’d filled the parchment with numbers and letters in ink, she felt emotionally empty and tired, longing for some sleep or just a relaxing bath with a good book and some chocolate cake, but she knew that wasn’t possible, so she settled for wanting a hug.

When she came up to James in the common room, where the Marauders were apparently heading down for lunch, he held her without a question, until her heart was beating at a normal pace again, guided by his steady heartbeat. Without a question, that was, until he spotted the letter that she was, again, holding in her hand.

“What’s that?” He asked, curiously eyeing the envelope.

“A letter,” she answered uncertainly, fidgeting. “From my family.”

“You don’t want to open it?”

She looked down to her feet, thinking. She felt so stupid in front of James, whose parents had died, for Merlin’s sake, when she thought about the problems in her family. If she didn’t open the letter, what would he think of her? At least for her, it was still possible to receive letters!

“Uh, of course, I just haven’t had the time until now…”

They walked out of the portrait hole, and down the stairs, way behind the rest of the group, and Lily slowly ripped open the envelope. She pulled a folded piece of paper out of it.

‘Lily’, it read. ‘We hope you are spending a pleasant Christmas time. Seeing as your sister is presenting us her fiancés family on Christmas and they will be spending the holiday with us, we need not only your room but also to make a good, normal impression. Petunia has explicitly wished for that. We will be very busy planning their wedding, too, and the house will be full. It would arrange everyone a lot better if you stay at your school for Christmas, where certainly your particular interests are shared. All the best, your parents.’

“Wow,” Lily muttered. James, discreetly having looked some other way before, glanced at the letter in her hand.

“What does it say?”

“Basically that I’m not allowed to go home this Christmas,” she answered darkly. “And you could’ve thought they’re writing to a distinct business partner, not their own daughter.” She let out a short laugh, blinking back hot tears that threatened to trickle out of her eyes.

“Can I… read it?” James requested, carefully, and simultaneously taking Lily’s hand in his own, squeezing it slightly. She handed him the letter. When he’d finished reading it, he stared at her, his mouth hanging open and his brows furrowed.

“What?” He asked sharply. Lily looked down; she was still fighting tears. They’d stopped in the middle of the hallway, but neither of the two noticed. “They can’t be serious, can they?”

“I knew that our relationship practically didn’t exist anymore,” Lily whispered, her voice small, breaking. “But I didn’t think that they’d give up this fast.”  
She couldn’t take it anymore, and started crying. James pulled her into his arms and manoeuvred them to the side of the hallway, so that they weren’t on public display anymore, before softly caressing her hair and muttering comforting words, until the tears had stopped and Lily looked at him again.

“I’m sorry… What happened to you is so much worse…”

“There’s no worse or better when it comes to your pain, to what you feel,” James said, sternly. “Your sadness is just as valid as mine, and not the slight bit less just because your parents are still alive. When you are sad, you are sad, and that is completely normal. Never ever apologize to me again for telling me how you feel, yes?”

His voice became gradually softer, his hand caressed her cheek. The look in his eyes was intense.

“You can talk to me about everything, and every time you trust me enough to tell me what is up with you that makes me incredibly happy. Do you understand that? I just love to be able to help you, simply because I love you.”

When he had finished his speech, he was a little out of breath, and his glasses had slid down his nose so that they were dangerously close to falling down, but yet again, neither of them cared.

“Thank you,” Lily whispered. “Thank you so much.”

“Anytime. Do you want me to get you something to eat and rather stay in the dormitory until Herbology this afternoon?” He looked at her questioningly, still holding her with his comforting arms.

“I’d love to,” she admitted. He smiled.

“Head upstairs, love. I’ll be there in a few. I’ll bring chocolate cake!”

With that, he vanished. Lily stood alone in the corridor for a moment, not moving at all. Her life wasn’t perfect right now, definitely not – she was stressed by school, there was a war going on and her parents didn’t want her home anymore – but she definitely had the best boyfriend ever.

And it was, of all possible boys – James Potter. The guy who seemed to know her better than anyone else, and maybe he really did. The guy who, now that they had both grown up, understood her, protected her, and loved her.

And, last but not least, the boy that she loved. This Christmas, she’d just focus on that, and everything would be fine. Somewhat.


	15. 15th of December

James concentrated on his breath to calm down, when all he could see, staring at the Transfiguration exam sheet, were lines and letters that didn’t seem to have any relation. He adjusted his glasses, took one last breath and looked over to Lily once, seeing her write continuously. He smiled.

Then, he took another look at the questions and could suddenly make them out. They weren’t even that hard, he realized, and, relieved, he began to write down the answers as well. While, being one of the Marauder’s leaders and known as a troublemaker and Quidditch captain mainly, nobody expected him to care for school, his grades were rather important to him.

Studying wasn’t really his thing, but he liked to learn, and he absolutely wanted his UTZs to be able to become an Auror. He couldn’t remember ever wanting to become something else – from the early age of five years, when he listened to his parents’ stories about dark wizards and fights that they’d won, he’d wanted to become like them. Fighting the dark was his dream, especially now that his parents had given their lives for that mission and that this world was at war.

People died every day, soldiers from both sides and muggles that knew nothing about what was happening in the world, while they were sitting in the safety of Hogwarts, protected mainly by some curses that didn’t seem too effective (Bellatrix had got into the castle, hadn’t she?) and Albus Dumbledore, who was for some reason the wizard that Voldemort feared most.

James had written to paragraphs when he looked at Lily again. She was now thinking, chewing on her quill and staring out of the window. He couldn’t see her face, only her wild red hair that he loved so much, but he could imagine her expression exactly. She’d furrowed her brows and scrunched up her nose a little, for sure.

Lily was the best thing that had happened to him since the beginning of the school year – since the Marauders, really. He was incredibly grateful for a girl like her, and for friends like them, especially Sirius and Remus.

He had to admit, he was kind of surprised at them being together all of a sudden. When he’d shared that information with Lily, she had looked at him as if he was mad. So what if he didn’t suspect that his best friends were shagging that easily? He was happy for them, of course. Looking back at the last few weeks, of course he saw all of the signs that he’d missed, but, as an excuse, he’d really been somewhere else with his mind during the last few days.

He finished writing down the answer to the last question at the very moment that Professor McGonagall reminded the class that there were only five minutes left of their time. He could see Peter to rows in front of him, having barely filled out half of the sheet but apparently not giving a damn, Sirius proofreading and crossing something out in his messy writing, Remus carefully writing the last few phrases and Lily hectically proofreading.

This Christmas would be the weirdest Christmas of all his life, and the saddest.

He would be staying at Hogwarts. Lily would be staying. Sirius would be staying. Remus would, probably, as he too was having problems with his parents, be staying. He had no idea about Peter, but he supposed the boy would go home. They wouldn’t miss him, the four of them, but while he was really grateful that he was able to call those people friends, it would be a bitter holiday.

What was Christmas, without family?

James couldn’t imagine it yet, and, knowing that he’d have to live it at just seventeen, he was boiling with anger at the injustice of the world.

“The exam is over,” Professor McGonagall announced. “Please let go of your parchment, it might be unfortunate if I summoned you with them.” When she released the class, James got up and left the classroom immediately. He had a destination in mind.

Three minutes later, he knocked on the door to Professor Dumbledore’s office. The door opened soon; he climbed up the stairs, where, yet again, he found the second door already opened. Dumbledore was sitting at his desk, smiling.

“James,” he greeted. “Can I help you?”

“Yes, actually,” James answered, a little out of breath from the hurry. “Can I talk to you about something?”

“Sure,” Dumbledore said. “Please sit down.” He looked at James carefully.

“It’s not about me,” the boy started right away. He didn’t want pity, and he didn’t want to talk about his parents right now when in this very moment, he was feeling okay. “It’s about what happened to Sirius.”

“I meant to ask him about it soon, when it won’t be as fresh anymore. What do you know?”

“Regulus and Bellatrix Black did that to him,” James said through gritted teeth. “He came to my house during the holidays because he couldn’t stand it anymore at home, and now I know more about why – you see, he told Remus – but I don’t want to tell you about this. This is just to tell you that maybe you really should talk to him.”

He took a breath before coming to his real point.

“This is not about Sirius’ family, I don’t have the right to tell you about it, Professor. This is about Hogwarts’ safety conditions. I’m worried about the students’ safety.”

“Do tell me more,” Dumbledore insisted. He had stopped smiling now.

“Bellatrix Black is, as you know, no longer a student of Hogwarts, but still, she got into the school grounds and the building itself, and during my Transfiguration exam, I wondered how that was possible.”

Dumbledore was thinking hard now, and James let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding when he saw that the Headmaster was taking him seriously.

“I’ll be sure to talk about this with the staff,” the professor finally said. “Promise. You are right – the hexes that protect this school might be a bit old-fashioned by now, especially regarding the situation we are in. Thank you, James, for coming directly to me. I’ll make sure to tell you when something has changed.”

“Thank you, Professor.” James nodded slightly and stood up, wanting to leave, but Dumbledore held him back for a moment.

“James,” he smiled, sincerely. “You’ll make a great Auror. A sense of observation, bravery and a kind heart are the qualities that you will need most, and I will make sure to put in a good word for you when you apply for the academy.”

“Thank you, Professor,” James repeated.

When had left Dumbledore’s office, he was already feeling a lot better. Even though yes, Christmas this year would be sad and bitter and quite probably not feel like Christmas – he’d survive. And next year, it would already be better.

“Life goes on,” he muttered to himself, before heading downstairs to the Great Hall to meet his friends at the Gryffindor table. At least he wasn’t all alone.


	16. 16th of December

On Wednesday, there was a snowstorm, and when Sirius looked outside, he smiled. The weather fit his mood, and the white outside hid everything under a mass of cold snow and made every sound a lot less loud. He liked the silence, and he liked the mess that everything was. Everything but his relationship with Remus of course; but the snow also had a beautiful side, so even that fit.

Dumbledore had forbidden everyone to go outside at breakfast, but the seventh years really didn’t care about that, it wasn’t like they had any free time during this week. Before lunch, they had to pass a DADA exam, and after lunch, it’d be Herbology. Sirius was good at DADA; he was especially good at recognizing the dark curses, mind you, but he could counter them quite well, too.

So, naturally, he excelled at the exam, first a theoretic exam and then a practical one. When he left the classroom, he felt a bitter high of success and victory that had surely also been provoked by the anger that was still inside of him, burning white-hot. Walking down to the Great Hall to finally eat, Professor Dumbledore stopped him in the middle of a hallway.

“Sirius, I was hoping to meet you. In fact, I was even looking for you. I thought that you probably wouldn’t appreciate it if I sent someone to tell you that I wish to talk to you, from what I gathered about last week’s incident. Would you mind coming with me?” He smiled.

“Sure,” Sirius answered, but he didn’t feel so sure.

“Great.”

He shrugged at his friends, and Remus looked at him with a little frown, but still let him go. It was Dumbledore, after all. A second after they’d started walking towards Dumbledore’s office, Sirius trailing behind a little and the Headmaster marching briskly in front, Sirius’ stomach grumbled loudly. He cleared his throat uncomfortably.

“It’s lunchtime…”

“Oh, it surely is. I’ll make sure to not let you starve while we have our little talk,” Dumbledore chuckled. They continued walking in silence, which was only broken by the occasional rumble of Sirius’ stomach, until they had reached the Headmaster’s office.

“Sit down, please,” Dumbledore said, while sitting down himself on the other side on the desk. He turned around as soon as Sirius was seated, talking to a portrait on the wall. Sirius tilted his head to the right and watched attentively.

“Dexter, would you mind visiting your portrait in the kitchen and ask the house elves to prepare some food for young Mr. Black here?”  
The man in the portrait, who had obviously enjoyed food and alcoholic beverages rather a lot during his lifetime, nodded at once and strode away from the office inside his portrait.

“Dexter Fortescue?” Sirius asked, amused. He’d heard talking of him; everyone had, everyone who had already payed visit to Florean Fortescue’s ice cream parlour in Diagon Alley. Sirius had, on multiple occasions even, almost all of them with James. The man was very nice and had once even given him free ice cream as a child, when his mother had refused to pay him one. That was something Sirius had never forgotten.

“Correct,” Dumbledore affirmed, smiling. “So, Sirius… I was hesitating to ask you, but I realized now that I’ve probably underestimated your strength, but also the psychological consequences that keeping everything you might want to talk about has. I’ve come to the conclusion that we should talk.”

Sirius didn’t say anything. He shifted uncomfortably. It’d been clear that Dumbledore would want to talk to him about this at a moment – but still, he hadn’t really thought about it.

“James has come to see me yesterday,” Dumbledore continued, realizing that Sirius wouldn’t talk so far. “He was concerned about the castle’s safety measures, and I absolutely agree. I can confirm you that we have already strengthened the charms that are supposed to protect the castle and you, the students, and we are still figuring out ways to make them even more effective. If your cousin should try again-“

He was cut off by a big golden plate with various steaming foods that just appeared in the middle of his desk. A few seconds later, Dexter Fortescue returned from his kitchen portrait, breathing hard. Drops of sweat were running down his forehead, but he was beaming.

“Thank you, Dexter.”

“Yeah, thanks,” Sirius added. He’d already taken the first bite of his steak (he was thankful that a fork and a knife had appeared with the plate) and was chewing hungrily.

“My pleasure,” the portrait returned gallantly, and sat back down in his red cushioned armchair. Dumbledore watched Sirius eating for a moment before he resumed his speech, and chuckled.

“Well, at least your appetite hasn’t suffered. As I was saying, she wouldn’t get into the castle, in case you’re feeling in danger now. Unfortunately, I have no evidence against your brother – but I suppose that you wouldn’t want me to throw him out, anyways?”

Sirius quickly swallowed the food that he had in his mouth and shook his head.

“I guess that wouldn’t be right,” he said, quietly. “He’d just go join Voldemort… It’s better keeping him here. Even though we can’t change anything, maybe Hogwarts can prevent him from becoming even more extreme… Although, honestly, that is hardly imaginable.”

The Headmaster nodded, apparently deep in thoughts. He cleared his throat after another minute.

“Alright, I thought so. Do you maybe have an idea about other students that are in danger of joining Voldemort’s sides? The insecure ones that are always looking for someone stronger to guide them are really in danger, those that have never been excellent at anything and those that are still looking for their place in life, the group that they belong to and the beliefs that are really theirs, are the ones that are endangered at most.”

Sirius thought about it – of course, he knew that a lot of Slytherins had no bigger dream than to have the Dark Mark on their forearms, but he was sure that Dumbledore already knew about them. When he thought about someone who was weak, mediocre and always trailing behind others, behind stronger students… The first person that came to his mind was Peter. But that was impossible, wasn’t it?

“I have one in mind,” he finally said, unsure. “I’ll look more closely and talk to you about it when I know more, Professor.”

“Thank you, Sirius.” Dumbledore was still smiling, but there was worry in his eyes. “So, how are you feeling, Sirius? Can you cope with what has happened to you? Can your friends help you?”

“Yes, they are really great.” Sirius nodded. He pushed the empty plate away. “Thanks for the food. But, anyways, we are a really great group now, and especially me and Remus…”

He blushed a little. Was it appropriate to talk about this with your Headmaster? Besides, the man was really old, too. But he’d asked after all, hadn’t he?

“Yes, I’ve noticed,” Dumbledore chuckled. “Mind, I can’t blame you; he’s a nice guy, and I’m sure that you two are good for each other. Back in my days, it was almost exactly the same… I was more the studious type, you see? And then there he was, Quidditch player for Hufflepuff… It didn’t last ages, but it was quite nice, indeed.”

Sirius stared at the man in front of him with wide eyes. Dumbledore had been in a relationship with a man? The Headmaster was even cooler than he’d thought! It was weird already to imagine Dumbledore as a teen, at Hogwarts himself, but imagining him in a relationship… No way. Unimaginable. Frankly, Sirius wasn’t even sure whether he wanted to imagine that. But he’d surely have an interesting story to tell later on.

“So, I guess you should go join your friends in the common room,” Dumbledore suggested when Sirius didn’t do anything but sit in his armchair, opening and closing his mouth with wide eyes like a fish. “I’ve kept you for long enough. Don’t forget keeping an eye on the person you were thinking of, please…”

“Yeah,” Sirius stuttered. “Yes, of course. Thank you, Professor.” He got up.

“You can talk to me whenever you feel like it. Good evening, Sirius.”

“Good evening, Professor.”

He left the office, strangely feeling relieved, but also exhausted. All that he wanted now was to get a cuddle from Remus and some sleep. Luckily, his friends were in the common room by the fireplace (the seventh years did have special rights during exams week) and Remus didn’t question it at all when Sirius fell right into his lap, snuggled up against his chest and closed his eyes without saying a word.

Even a leather jacket motorbike guy like Sirius Black, bad seed of the family, needed to be cuddled sometimes. Right?


	17. 17th of December

It would be the least to say the Remus was pretty fucking exhausted. He was exhausted to such an extent that he almost fell asleep during their History of Magic exam on Thursday morning. In reality, he did even fall asleep – but that was just because Professor Binns made exams so short that they could be finished in about an hour, while they had two for the exam. Tired as he was, Remus fell asleep during proofreading.

He was woken up by a little parchment plane that hit him in the head. Groggily, he sat up straight, and let go of his sheet only just in time for Professor Binns to collect them. It was Sirius who had sent the plane. Remus smiled at him, mouthing “thanks” in the hectic before the class was released. He quickly joined Sirius, James and Peter in the corridor after having packed up his stuff.

Sirius looked at him worriedly.

“You’re exhausted!” He complained. “You do too much, Moony! You need breaks!”

He took his boyfriend’s hand and led him back to the Gryffindor common room. They had free period before lunch, and he was going to make the best use of that. (Originally, they were meant for studying, but sleeping was way more important. Also, he had taken to closely observing Peter since his talk with Dumbledore, and the boy was behaving weirdly.

He wasn’t as attached to the group anymore as he’d been, and he didn’t seem as eager to please them. He seemed absent-minded all the time, and Sirius could’ve sworn that he’d scoffed at a muggleborn second year student this very morning. Scoffing wasn’t very Peter. Squealing, yes, shrieking – but he never scoffed.

When Remus wanted to sit down in an armchair, already pulling his notes out of his bag to revise yet again, Sirius shook his head briskly and pulled the smaller boy out of the common room and into the boys’ dormitory.

“You, my dear,” he announced sternly, in his best imitation of Professor McGonagall, which almost made Remus laugh, “need to rest. So you are going to lie down right now and I, the humble and kind-hearted man that I am, am going to tell you a story. I’ll even let you chose the bed. Mine or yours?”

Remus, having accepted that he had no right to put in a veto and thus suddenly ten times more tired, stumbled to Sirius’ bed and lay down. He yawned and inhaled Sirius’ comforting scent. His eyelids dropped close immediately, and he heard Sirius’ voice only like through a massive cloud of cotton wool. He faintly noticed that someone (that person was quite probably Sirius, or else the situation would be rather awkward) was stroking his back, and smiled into the soft pillow.

“There was once a boy who was unfortunately named Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, because his parents were unable to decide on just one or two names, who went to Hogwarts in a time none of us today can even imagine. He was a charming, studious person, who honoured bravery and honesty, but who loved his books and learning more than anything – except for, apparently, Quidditch players.”

Remus sat up straight, suddenly no longer tired at all.

“Wait, where do you get this from?” He asked, rubbing his eyes a little to be able to focus his glance better on Sirius, who was laughing.

“From the man himself,” he chuckled. “Do you want to hear the rest of the story?”

“I’d love to,” Remus said dryly. He let himself fall back onto the back. This was certainly interesting.

“He was Head Boy,” Sirius continued (the fact was common knowledge, and make the story even better), “determined and hard-working. But in his free time, he fancied a certain Hufflepuff Quidditch captain… who, by the way, fancied him back. Remus Lupin, I can hereby confirm that Albus Dumbledore himself is gay and tells me you’re a nice boy. I’m therefore even more grateful to have you, and I’m going to kiss you now.”

Remus didn’t have a chance to say anything before he was cut off by Sirius kissing him softly, almost lying on top of him. The beater was holding himself in the air only with his strong arms that Remus loved so much (thinking back, he’d fancied them even before he’d known that he fancied Sirius – they were the only reason for that he’d done push-ups during third year, but trying to get extra muscles apart from the werewolf ones didn’t work) and both boys were breathing unevenly.

“Think about Dumbledore, in this dormitory,” Sirius whispered, biting his lip seductively, but also preventing himself from laughing like that. But there, he’d gone too far. Remus pushed him off with a disgusted cry, and apparently his arm muscles couldn’t be that weak, because Sirius fell right off the bed and landed on the ground with a soft thump.

“You’re absolutely disgusting!” He cried out, shivering. “I’m going to have nightmares for weeks about that!”

“Maybe that was my goal.” Sirius’ voice came from the ground. He sounded pained. “So now I’ll have to protect you. But in hindsight, that really doesn’t seem necessary. You are fucking strong, by Merlin! I won’t be able to sit for weeks.”

“Maybe that was my goal,” Remus countered, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

“You could’ve done that in another way…” Remus could hear Sirius’ smirk before he could even see it, and blushed furiously. Merlin, he hadn’t meant that to sound suggestive! They were far from that point.

“I’m only joking, you know that?” Sirius asked softly when Remus didn’t answer. “I’m not trying to push you, or anything.”  
Remus sighed deeply.

“I know. I feel like a silly teenage girl.”

“Well, technically you are a silly teenage boy. Which is why I love you.”

“I love you too. Can I get a cuddle?”  
Sirius threw himself onto Remus immediately and wrapped his arms around his boyfriend’s neck. Remus closed his eyes and enjoyed the warmth that Sirius always seemed to provide.

“I don’t know how you do it,” he mumbled finally, “but you always make me feel better. You are my family.”  
Sirius smiled brightly with shining eyes like a child’s on Christmas day when he pulled away to look at Remus properly.

“And you are mine.”


	18. 18th of December

“Tell Bella not to try again like that,” Peter whispered. Regulus Black and he were crouched behind a snowy tree on the grounds. He had to rub his hands together even though he was wearing gloves in order not to freeze, and every now and then, an icy wind made both of them flinch. Nevertheless this was the only place in the castle where they could really talk without being disturbed.

“Why?” Regulus demanded sharply. He was quite a bit taller than Peter, and unlike the small, blond boy actually looked scary due to his Black-attitude, dark hair and dark eyes. Peter shivered slightly, this time not because of the cold.

“J- Potter has gone to see the Headmaster,” he answered, stumbling over his words. “To complain. They’re upping the safety measures… Getting inside here is a lot more difficult now, so. I guess.”

Regulus frowned. He furrowed his eyebrows angrily and let out a scoff that was visible in the piercing air as a little white cloud, which made him seem even more dangerous. Peter couldn’t help thinking of a dragon that had been woken from his sleep, and instinctively took a small step back.

“That Potter boy,” Regulus hissed. “You would’ve thought that he’s incapable of anything else than mourning after mommy, but apparently he’s rather trying to follow his parents noble example.” He laughed shortly, the sarcasm in his words so obvious that Peter was able to understand it, which he wasn’t very often. So he laughed along a little breathlessly.

“Anyways,” Regulus continued. “I’ll contact Bella about it; you go on doing your job. Try to kiss their ugly asses still a bit more.”

“Who have you just called ugly?” An all too familiar voice suddenly asked from behind. Peter jumped terribly, while Regulus merely closed his eyes in a short moment of desperation.

“S-Sirius,” stuttered Peter. He wasn’t looking at the taller boy that was so similar to Regulus, but, though the older one of the two, with a little less edge and a little less sharpness in his features and actions. Nevertheless, when Sirius wanted to he could easily be just as terrifying as his younger brother. Right now, he wanted to.

“Yes, Peter. It’s me. I see that you’re enjoying a nice little walk outside with my lovely brother? And incidentally you have taken the map with you, haven’t you? May I ask what you two have to discuss that is so secret that you risk Peter’s hands freezing off for it? Not that they’re worth a lot, anyways…” There was a grim glim in his eyes and a dangerous undertone to his voice.

“Nothing!” Peter said, quickly. “He was threatening me, I swear!”

Sirius didn’t need to just look at his brother to know that Peter was lying. So he’d read the signs right before, and everything that Dumbledore had told him had been true. He’d been expecting it kind of, sure, but still, it hurt to find out that a member of the Marauders was in reality fighting for their worst enemy. He’d probably even taken part in James’ parents’ death! The single emotion that was controlling Sirius’ actions in that moment was white-hot anger.

“You’re lying,” he spat. “I’ve always known that he’s good for nothing, but his level is still higher than yours, Peter! Spying on those people that were nice enough to count you as their friend. Helping to kill James’ parents! What the hell have you thought? That you could finally be great under Voldemort? That you’d finally find your purpose and that you’d finally be really appreciated?”

He needed to breathe. The two Death Eaters in front of him weren’t moving. While Peter was obviously terrified, but still had that determined expression to his face, Regulus simply seemed to be amused. When Sirius was able to resume his speech, after what felt like hours but really not even were ten seconds, he was shouting.

“Let me tell you something! You will never be great. You aren’t bright, nor are you brave, you are not loyal and you aren’t even nice. But while you were born to be always a bit below average, you could’ve fucking made the right choices, by Merlin. You could’ve chosen to be nice. You could’ve chosen to stick with us and to make us really appreciate you. You could’ve picked out something you are good at, instead of always aiming to be the greatest. It would’ve been okay not to be great! But this, Peter, this is not okay.”

He urged forward unexpectedly, grabbing Peter’s arm with a merciless grip. In his free hand, he was holding his wand, while the blond was defenceless. Unfortunately, Regulus wasn’t. In a swift movement, the Slytherin pulled his wand out of his back pocket and directed it at Sirius.

“What are you going to do?” He asked, calmly. Sirius scoffed, and it didn’t sound so much different from Regulus’ scoff a little earlier.

“Take him to Dumbledore,” he answered. Peter’s eyes widened.

“No!” He screamed. “No, you won’t!”

It wasn’t that he was afraid of Albus Dumbledore. The man was a lot too weak to really punish him. Should he get expelled, he’d just go join his masters. He didn’t believe in what Sirius had said. When he was doing his Death Eater duties, he didn’t feel alone anymore. He felt like a part of a bigger something, a greater good; he felt appreciated and he didn’t feel useless for once. As a Death Eaters, he could forget about anyone who had once been better than him because now, they were merely scum. Pureblood was the only way. But his master was powerful and strong, and he wouldn’t be happy when he learned that Peter had failed his job as a spy. Oh, how he was afraid of the punishment that awaited him. But he’d endure it. It was well deserved, after all, and it was for the greater good.

“Oh yes, I will,” Sirius said. His voice was dangerously quiet.

“Oh no, you won’t,” Regulus said. He fired a curse at Sirius, who reacted so quickly that neither Regulus nor Peter really saw it, screaming “Protego” at the top of his lungs. The curse backfired, but in order for the protection charm to work, he had needed to let go of Peter’s hand. Peter, immediately, turned into a rat and ran away as quickly as he could. He’d vanished within seconds – Sirius could only hope that he’d freeze to death, running around as a tiny animal in the masses of snow, but he highly doubted it. Peter was a survivor.

Regulus smirked, firing another curse at him. Sirius blocked it easily.

“This is ridiculous,” he muttered through gritted teeth. “Stop it!”

“Why?” Regulus jeered. “Is my big brother afraid?”

“Of your hands falling off,” Sirius answered. “Apart from that, no.” He fired another curse at Regulus, burning of some of his hair on full purpose. He didn’t actually want to injure his brother, he wouldn’t get down on Regulus’ level, but he wanted to injure his pride.

“Good bye, Regulus,” he said coldly. Assuming that the Death Eaters knew about them being Animagi anyways, as the Slytherin hadn’t seemed the slightest bit surprised when Peter had simply transformed into a rat, he turned into the big black dog as whom he’d come and eavesdropped the fatal conversation, and ran away. He didn’t hear anymore what Regulus shouted after him.

So, while Sirius was getting back up to the castle, Regulus following him far behind, muttering curses under his breath, Peter was running. He was running away from Hogwarts, the school he hated, the place where he’d never been happy. He was running towards his master, where he would finally be at the right place, doing the right things, and having an actual purpose.

He didn’t see anything of the riot that broke out in the castle when the news spread that Peter Pettigrew, of whom nobody would’ve ever head if he weren’t part of the Marauders, had run off – to join the other side.

Dumbledore in his office shook his head sadly. There lay the power that Voldemort had. He was able to convince young people, to form them how he wanted them to be, and to make them believe in his own beliefs. He chose the weakest and the average to be his most important followers, black sheep amongst the rows of dark wizards from old families like he’d once been one. He chose them as underdogs, and he made them feel better at first, so that they became loyal and dependant on him like on a drug, the drug of confidence and the feeling of being worth something, until they were caught in the deadly swirl of quicksand, separated from their old friends and their own family.

At this point, everything was lost, and the soldier that he’d created would be ready to do anything and everything for him.

It could happen to anyone – and it had happened now, under his eyes, to Peter Pettigrew. The single positive thing about the happening was that he’d at least been discovered. He’d never be able to work as a spy again.

Sirius, meanwhile, after having shown of his strong and fierce side facing Peter, crumbled as soon as he was safe in Remus’ bed.

“Why haven’t we seen?” He mumbled over and over. “We could’ve prevented this…”

“You have seen it, Sirius,” Remus muttered comfortingly. He was stroking his boyfriends’ hair slightly. “Right after Dumbledore told you what you had to look for. And you discovered him! You should be proud of yourself, not blaming yourself. I am proud of you.”

And even though he wasn’t convinced, Sirius managed to smile.

James and Lily were talking to a bunch of scared first-years. As Head Girl and Head Boy, it was their duty to calm down the students that were deeply shocked by what had happened. It was now that even the younger ones started to realize that there was a war going on.  
James, holding Lily’s hand, the constant touch comforting them both, sighed.

“Listen,” he said. “You don’t have to worry about your safety. Here, at Hogwarts, nothing will happen to you. But if you ever notice one of your friends behaving weirdly, or distancing themselves, never hesitate to talk to me, Lily here or the Headmaster himself. Those are signs of radicalisation. If we are able to stop them the process at the very beginning, we already have won one small fight against Voldemort.”

The first-years nodded solemnly. Some of them had dried stains of tears on their rosy cheeks, and the older students felt pity that they had to suffer this at the early age of eleven. But then again, they weren’t older than seventeen themselves, were they?

“Sadly,” Lily continued. “We weren’t able to help Peter anymore. But you might be able to help others. The most important thing right now is not to panic. If you have any problems or worries, don’t hesitate to talk to us. I know that sometimes we seem a lot more grown up than you – but really, we’re still just students and only wizards, yeah? You can also talk to the Prefects, because there is more of them.”

Dumbledore held a longer speech at dinner that evening, partly because the winter holidays were starting and of course because of Peter. It was a lot more serious than normally. He concluded with just a few words that would rest in the students’ hearts for a long time.

“We have lost one student already. Now, we need to stick together and to unite ourselves against the darkness more than ever!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter and those about Peter in general are mainly about the process of radicalisation. With what's going on in the world, I feel like everyone could use a bit of information about what's really going on in for example ISIS.  
> The Death Eaters might be a very simple example, but there's nevertheless quite a bit of information to pass on.  
> Spread the world, guys. It could happen to anybody.  
> In my opinion, we don't need to fight and win a war. We need to prevent one!


	19. 19th of December

Almost nobody took the train home on Saturday, the first day of the vacation. It had snowed yet again, but this morning the sky was of a deep and clear blue that you could only spot in the mountains normally. The sun was shining brightly, but it was still icy cold outside. The three Marauders, now essentially down to the important members, while Peter hadn’t really been more than a follower and thus nothing during the last time, sat at the breakfast table with shadows under their eyes and expressionless faces.

Lily and Marlene weren’t much better – no one of the six was really eating. James had wrapped his arm around Lily’s shoulder as if to protect her, and Lily leaned against him gratefully. She’d been munching on the same piece of peanut butter toast for five minutes now, while James was just playing around with some beans on his plate that normally he loved, instead of eating them.

At the staff table, the mood wasn’t much better. Within just a week, a student had been injured by Death Eaters and another student had been taken away on his free will by them. Those were two heavy defeats in Hogwarts’ fight against the Death Eaters. Voldemort and the wizards who had already chosen the wrong side had now managed to frighten an entire school. The Slytherins, or at least quite a few of them, seemed a lot less bothered than the other houses. Dumbledore felt anger rising at him, but that was good for nothing, and he knew it. He successfully suppressed the burning feeling. It was not their fault. They didn’t even have to play on Voldemort’s side to have been taught from a very early age that they needn’t fear wizards like him. They were of pure blood, after all. Dumbledore sighed.

“Minerva,” he muttered. “Don’t you think that we ought to cheer up our students a bit?”  
Professor McGonagall, sitting next to him, was observing the students as well, and quickly agreed.

“What were you thinking of, Albus?” She asked, now looking at the Headmaster with that questioning look that she’d perfected, glancing over her glasses instead of through them and raising her thin eyebrows.

“I thought that maybe a snowball fight would be a fabulous idea.” Dumbledore chuckled at his fellow teacher’s horrified expression, but he didn’t change his mind because of her. “We’ll get all the teachers to come out there with us, and the students will be safe! We need to take their mind off of this, it’s Christmas and they should enjoy it. They’re just children.”

At that argument he had her. Minerva McGonagall, who was often seen as a stern and not really caring person by their students, in reality felt a strong need to protect each of her “children”, and for them to be happy. (As long as they did their homework, mind you!) So she agreed, nodding carefully. Dumbledore joyfully clapped his hands.

“Wonderful!” He spoke up after that, rising from his chair. The student’s attention was on him within seconds, as it had already been uncomfortably silent in the Great Hall before. The animated chatter and laughing were missing.

“Students of Hogwarts, I hereby challenge you to a snowball fight! It will take place outside right after breakfast. It shall leave you with hungry stomachs and a hint of a smile on your faces.”

His words immediately brought new life into the Great Hall. The students cheered, and quickly finished eating so they could get outside.  
Dumbledore watched them from the stairs to the castle’s entry, smiling. Youth was such a pure thing. Within minutes, they could forget all anger and fear they’d felt before. Yet he was no longer able to forget or just to block out the darkness in his mind. Professor McGonagall approached him from behind with a worried expression.

“Albus,” she muttered. “The Aurors are trying to catch Orion Black. We ought to protect Sirius Black even better until they’ve caught him.”

“Thank you, Minerva.” He watched the boy closely with his friends. They were bewitching the snowballs to hit other students (especially Slytherins, he realized, and if Regulus Black over there did have a bloody nose, he hadn’t seen anything).

When Sirius and Remus saw that James was really getting into the fight and getting help from Lily (the two made a fantastic duo, in fact, Lily with the finesse and James with the efficiency), they distanced themselves from the large crowd and half-hid behind a tree to get some privacy.

“Do you feel safe?” Remus asked softly. Sirius shrugged. He glanced at the teachers that were observing them closely. Did he see Dumbledore smirk?

“I don’t feel less safe than any of us, I guess,” he answered. “But I’m afraid that we will have to cancel our Hogsmeade date tomorrow… I’d rather not leave the castle.”

“We had a date?” Remus let go of Sirius to look at his boyfriend questioningly. He was beaming.

“I was going to ask you out,” Sirius admitted bluntly. He leaned his forehead against Remus’, and lowered his voice. “In fact, Remus, would you like to go on a date with me?”

“I’d love to,” Remus whispered, blushing slightly. “By Merlin, I’d so love to.”

“So it’s a date,” Sirius whispered back. They kissed softly, not really knowing who had initiated the kiss, and they would’ve kissed for ages – but suddenly, something wet and cold hit them right in the faces. Both of them jumped and frantically looked for who or what had disturbed them.  
From about twenty meters away, James and Lily were laughing like maniacs.

“You little shits!” Sirius screamed and urged forward. “You are the worst friends ever! Why do I even call you my friends?”  
Remus watched from behind when Sirius started a massive snowball fight against the two, smiling. Within two minutes, all three of them were absolutely soaking wet from snow that had slid into their cloaks and that had dampened their hair and shoes, and Remus saw that this was enough – he didn’t want to spend his holidays in the hospital wing, paying visit to his ill friends!

Sirius listened to him immediately, and Lily only had to shiver demonstratively to get James to obey and come inside with them as well. They spent the rest of their first free day playing cards and other games in the common room

In the evening about an hour before dinner, Sirius left Remus with James and Lily in the common room around the fireplace. The only information he’d given them had been a wink and a quick “surprise!” before he had vanished. He wanted to surprise Remus, and what made a man happier than food? He could think of one thing only, and as it might be a bit too early for that, he just settled with food, and went down into the kitchens to talk to the house elves about it. (He also loved tickling that pear.)

Next, he managed to find some blankets and carried them up to the astronomy tower. It was dark outside, and icy cold still; there were snowflakes dancing towards the ground through the air again, and it was just beautiful. Sirius cast a warming charm on a circle that he’d surrounded with a rope before, and started working on a blanket and pillow fort. He even hung up some fairy lights inside of it, and conjured up some extra fluffy extra pillows that he knew Remus would love.

He then descended all the stairs right down to the kitchens again and mounted them five minutes after, his arms loaded with food of all sorts. (There was not one single item that didn’t have chocolate on it, though.) There was a big cake with a fancy icing, and some chocolate covered fruits, and a few chocolate-cinnamon cookies… He was pretty sure that the house elves had also given him a lot of stuff he hadn’t even asked for (did he spot a gingerbread cake with a chocolate icing there?), and he promised himself to reward them sometime.

Everything was prepared about ten minutes before he knew they would get down to the Great Hall for dinner. He met the three of them right in front of the portrait hole, outside.

“I’m going to take Remus with me,” he announced, winking at his boyfriend with a slightly provocative smirk, which was rather meant for James, who promptly rolled his eyes.

“Keep it PG-rated as long as we are around!” He complained. Sirius just laughed and took Remus’ hand in his to pull him away.

“Have fun!” Lily called out after them before they had vanished behind the next corner.

“Thanks!” Sirius shouted back. They couldn’t properly hear the answer anymore.

“Where are you taking me?” Remus asked. He looked at Sirius with those puppy eyes that the other never could resist, except for now when he knew that keeping it the surprise actually a surprise would make Remus so much happier.

“You’ll have to wait,” he said mysteriously. The second sentence was added in a dry voice. “For approximately three minutes.”

Remus soon knew where they going – when they were heading up a tower, there usually weren’t many options, and the Astronomy tower was literally just that.

“What are we doing up there?”

“Stop asking questions!”

“But…”

“You’ll see!”

They climbed the last few stairs up to the platform. At first when Sirius pushed the trapdoor open, they were hit by an icy wind. Remus shivered.

“What can we possibly do up here it is freaking- by Merlin Sirius have you done this?” He stared at the fort, his mouth gaping wide open. All coldness was forgotten immediately.

“There’s a warming charm on it,” Sirius pointed out sheepishly.

“You’re an angel.” Remus kissed him boisterously, almost making them both falling down the ladder they were still standing on. Sirius grinned into the kiss.

“I know, but don’t you think we’d be more comfortable if we’d actually use what I’ve built there? Also, there’s food and I don’t know about you, but I am quite hungry.”

Remus chuckled and let his boyfriend go, so that they could both climb up the last few steps and quickly hide inside of the fort.

“This is absolutely adorable.” Remus stared at the fairy lights admiringly and let himself fall into the soft pillows. “Oh Merlin. I’m not going to get up ever again. I can even see the snow falling down from here, and I can hear the wind, but I can’t feel it, and this is so comfortable.”

Sirius laughed, leaning back to grab a plate with chocolate covered fruits. He guessed that it were strawberries, that was what their form suggested, but they were actually so well done that you couldn’t see the fruit anymore.

“Would you like some chocolate?”

“Are you even for real? This is the most perfect date I’ve ever had. It’s like the first, too, but nevertheless, this would be really hard to top!” Remus stared at the fruit in Sirius hand dreamily.

Sirius felt his heart swelling with love for the boy and with warmth because he’d managed to really make someone happy, and he felt like he hadn’t done that in a long time. Remus just accepted him as he was, and that was enough for him.

“I’m so lucky to have you,” he muttered and put the strawberry onto the boy’s lips teasingly. Remus grabbed it eagerly with his teeth and swallowed with an expression of pure bliss on his face.

“No, I am lucky to have you,” he said. “I love you so much.”

Sirius pulled the plate towards them so that he could reach it lying down, but still left the rest of the food outside of the warm circle to keep it cool. When he was lying next to Remus, both of them gazing at the silvery cloudy sky and the beautiful snowflakes, he turned to him and looked him right in the eyes. There, he didn’t see snow. He saw the stars.

“I love you more.”


	20. 20th of December

“It’s almost crazy that they let us go to Hogsmeade after all this, isn’t it?” Lily asked when they were leaving the castle after having been controlled by Argus Filch. The air was still biting cold so that her breath was visible when she spoke. The student pairs and groups of students were far from each other due to the strict controls, so the only noise was the crunching snow under their shoes. It was beautiful.

“They must’ve ordered some Aurors into the village to protect us.” James scratched his head with his free left hand. “And Sirius isn’t allowed to leave.”

“Yeah, well, they had their romantic date yesterday, hadn’t they?” Lily threw a glance back at the castle.

“Absolutely,” James laughed. “I didn’t even know that Sirius could be such a romantic.”

“Do you feel inspired now, Potter?” Lily teased. She let go of his warm hand and instead wrapped her arm around his middle. “Shall we go to Mme Puddifoot’s?”

When she saw James’ horrified expression and felt how he tensed up immediately, she broke into laughter. The absolute and utter relief on his face was about as good as the shock, so that she laughed for a good five minutes of the way, until she was so breathless that finally she couldn’t laugh anymore.

“You don’t really,” she gasped, “think that I am that type of girl? Mme Puddifoot’s? Seriously? Even the Butterbeer is pink there!”

“I think I can be romantic enough without Mme Puddifoot’s help,” James said and shivered once again at the thought of setting just one foot, or just one tip of his holy hair into the café. “We could go to Zonko’s!”

Lily just laughed. They had already reached the village that looked, under the layer of sugar-like snow, as if it had come directly out of a fairy tale. It seemed to be more crowded than usually, and when James studied the faces more intensely, he could make out that most of them really were Aurors, ancient friends of his parents that he’d known for his entire childhood. A woman winked at him. He winked back, wrapping his arm around Lily’s shoulders. The woman smirked, then she turned away to speak to the man that she’d been discussing with before.

“There’s Aurors everywhere,” James muttered into Lily’s ear. “This is so weird. I’ve known them forever and now they’re watching us, it’s like being with your parents on your first date!” He bit his lip directly after the sentence. Lily would never get to know his parents, and he probably wouldn’t get to know hers, either.

“They would’ve like you, you know,” he added. He could imagine the scene. He’d present Lily to his parents right after graduation, where she’d got better marks than he had, and they’d absolutely love her.

“That means a lot to me.” Lily smiled. “Mine wouldn’t like you, but you know, don’t take it personally. They don’t like me either, so they’d probably turn away and utter under their breaths that we’re the perfect fit or something like that. And let’s not talk about parents right now? It’s not the appropriate first thing to do, is it?”

James laughed and pulled her along right into a job. It wasn’t yet crowded with students and filled with cheerful chatter, but there were tables and shelves everywhere with boxes and weird-looking things stacked on them that sometimes randomly exploded. The pair ditched a miniature flying broom that seemed to be on fire just in time. It crashed into a stack of boxes instead, and they started burning threateningly fast. Lily reacted quickly.

“Aguamenti!” She shouted, pointing her wand at the flames. The water did its job well. At the exact moment that they had managed to stop the fire entirely, so there was only some dark grey smoke left, the shop holder rushed through the backdoor. His outraged expression turned to a bewildered one and then to gratefulness when James showed him the little broom that had caused the misery.

“That one again,” he sighed. “Well I guess I need to thank you! There’s an item of choice on the house for both of you. I quickly need to finish something up, be back in a second!” And with that, he rushed out of the room again.

James was thrilled. He immediately started looking around and trying to choose what they could make the best use of at school. Lily didn’t know the shop very well; she just looked at the shelf that she’d found herself right next to, discovering quills that always wrote the exact opposite of what you wanted them to, and fake glasses that made you see the world in changing colours, even though their appearance was see-through.

“Hey, Lils, look at this!” James called from the other side of the shop. “I can imagine this look too well on Regulus Black…” He pointed at a blond wig that apparently, if you believed the description, put full make-up on your face including bright red lipstick, blue-ish eyeshadow and mascara, and extreme contouring. Lily scoffed.

“Oh, please, that is ridiculous.” At that moment, two things happened at once and very quickly. Firstly, the shop holder rushed back into the room. Secondly, the boxes that had burned before exploded and spread glittery power in every colour that one could imagine all over the shop, including the people in it, the ceiling, the floor and everything in between.

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” The man hurried to scream. He waved his wand in a complex gesture and the glitter disappeared as quickly as it had come, getting back into its original boxes. “We haven’t really tested that one yet, it’s only just arrived, but apparently it works quite well – supposed to cover everything in glitter.”

James looked intrigued. Lily knew that glint in his eyes and what it meant. They were going to have to carry boxes up to the castle. But then again, the idea pleased her. They could all make use of some colour, especially with the situation they were in.

“Could we get some of that?” She’d known it!

“Yes, yes, of course! Let me pack it up for you…” The man was short, and red in the face (probably because he was constantly in a hurry). The cloak he was wearing was bright violet, and the hem was green. Lily observed him sceptically. She’d never quite get the wizarding view of colour. Speaking of colour, the man was putting some colourful little balls about the size and from of a snitch into bags. Lily was relieved when she saw that they wouldn’t have to carry enormous boxes after all, just two well-filled bags.

“On the house!” The man beamed when he gave them to the two. “A charming young lady like you as a prankster… I guess there’s some bad influence, isn’t there?” He winked at them.

James put his arm around Lily’s waist possessively and snatched her bag away from her so that he was carrying both of them.

“Thank you,” he said.

“Oh, I can only thank you, gentleman and lady!” And just like that, the man disappeared in the back of his shop already again.

“What a weirdo,” Lily grinned and shook her head when they were outside again. “And, by the way, I’m totally able to carry a bag!”

“I know that you’re able to, but I’m not able to let you,” James answered gallantly and she couldn’t resist the puppy eyes. “And he really was a weirdo, but we got some stuff for free. This will make some Hogwarts corridors so much better!”

They walked in silence for a minute or two. The village had filled up with students, the Aurors now weren’t as easily to spot anymore, and Lily was relieved. The atmosphere had changed, and the air already seemed to be much lighter with all the joyful students around them.

“I’m hungry,” James finally stated. “Do you prefer the Three Broomsticks or Honeydukes?”

“You choose?” Lily shrugged.

“Honeydukes it is,” James grinned. “Have you ever tried those mint chips that are your favourite coated in chocolate? They do that if you put in a special request.”

“How do you know what my favourite is?” Lily asked with furrowed eyebrows. She stopped walking in the middle of the street and made James stop as well. “I can’t remember ever telling you?”

“You are an open book to me,” James sing-songed and pulled her along. “Now don’t worry about me stalking you for years, worry about what you’re missing out on!”

Lily couldn’t help laughing. Why couldn’t she resist those eyes anymore? It hadn’t been a problem for six years, damn it! Then again, they’d both changed quite a lot during the past few months. And she really wanted to try mint chips coated in chocolate, so James was automatically forgiven.

Honeydukes was totally crammed with students, as it always was. There were students everywhere, chatting, trying free samples and putting more and more sweets in their bags. The noise and the smell were mounting to the ceiling and spreading everywhere in the brightly lit room. The warm, humid air was fogging the windows. From time to time, a student left a handprint on them when they tried to get some cold air. James and Lily fought their way through the mass of people to the opposite corner of the shop, where the mint chips were stored in shelves as high as the ceiling and probably bewitched to reach even higher. They didn’t let go of each other’s hands for a second, and were panting when they’d reached their destination. James grabbed a packet of mint chips. It rattled in his hand, and Lily smiled with satisfaction.

“Now do your magic and add the chocolate, and you shall be forgiven,” she joked. James stuck his tongue out at her, and she quickly used her chance to grab a pepper-flavoured chip sample and put it into his mouth. He coughed so hard that his face went all red and his mouth started to literally fume. Lily doubled over with laughter. She was still laughing when the burning had finally stopped, and James glared at her as if he was about to kill her.

“Chocolate?” She asked innocently. “We should also bring some for Remus and Sirius.”

James sighed deeply. He rubbed his forehead dramatically and adjusted his glasses. They were rather blocking him from seeing anything than making his sight better, with how foggy they’d become in the warmth, so he took them of and rubbed the glass with his t-shirt. When he put them on again, he was back to smiling.

“Right you are. Come on, we need to get to the counter. I have some connections.”

“You have connections everywhere, it is almost creeping me out.” They somehow managed to get through the crowd again. James didn’t let Lily see or hear what he did at the counter – “Go choose some chocolate for Remus and some sort of fruity thing for Sirius and bring them over here, I’ll buy them,” he’d told her – so it was still kind of a surprise when she returned with a box of dark chocolates that melted in the mouth and a bag of berry-candy that turned the tongue and lips pink or violet.

“Come on,” James repeated, waving a mysterious box around. It was red, and it rattled just the way she liked it, but she couldn’t see anything else before he hid it in a big Honeydukes bag. He also quickly payed for the things that she’d chosen for Remus and Sirius, and then pulled her out of the shop. The air outside hit them in the face like needles piercing their skin. Lily shivered violently.

“By Merlin, this is freaking cold,” she cursed under her breath. James nodded.

“Let’s pay Mme Rosmerta a visit,” he suggested. “I could do with a Butterbeer.”

They crossed the street. The Aurors were watching them out of the shadows, observing glances almost burning holes in their warm winter cloaks. James pushed the door to the Three Broomsticks open. A lot of students had already had the same idea and were now sitting in the comfortable booths with the cushioned benches and wooden tables. Lily found an empty booth and let herself sink into the soft seat while James went to get two Butterbeers from the barista. The air was warm but a lot less humid than at Honeydukes, and though it was full, the students were still able to move freely because everyone sat at their table in groups.

James came back, carrying their beverages and the Honeydukes bag like trophies. He sat down on the other side on the small table and put one of the big pints in front of Lily.

“Thank you,” she said and put her hands around it to warm them up.

“You’re welcome. And then you have to try these.” The deep red of the box already looked beautiful in the candle light and fit the blush on James’ cheeks perfectly. She took the first sip of her Butterbeer, which was always the best, when it was still perfectly warm and sweet-savoury. Then she carefully opened the package and popped one of the chocolate coated mint chips in her mouth. They were sweet at first, chocolatey, and then there was the minty, refreshing taste that she loved so much with the light prickle on her taste buds. Lily rolled her eyes up to the ceiling and sighed involuntarily.

“These are heaven,” she muttered. “How come I’ve never tried this before? I’ve wasted my entire life!”

James’ laughter made his chest rumble and his eyes tear. He took her hand under the table and held it tightly.

“With me, you’re not going to waste another second,” he promised. The table in between them was only slightly disturbing when their lips met, tasting like Christmas and chocolatey-minty. Perfect.


	21. 21st of December

“Sirius, can we talk?” The three Marauders were walking down the corridor when the hesitant voice suddenly came from behind. They turned around abruptly. Regulus looked down his shoes, weirdly vulnerable. There was a deadly silence around them for a minute. Nobody said a thing to cut the tension that made the air thick like plum pudding. James and Remus were piercing Regulus with their spiteful stares, but the Slytherin didn’t look up.

“I won’t let you go anywhere alone with him,” Remus spat finally and put his arm around Sirius’ waist, pulling the taller boy close. “You can’t talk to him without me.”

“Fine,” Regulus said. His desperate glance begged them to agree, and his dark eyes flicked around nervously, in fear of being seen.

“Okay,” Sirius said. His voice was as icy as the lake’s surface. “We’ll meet in the classroom on second floor twenty minutes from now. Remus comes with me. James waits outside. You come alone. If you do anything against the conditions, this agreement is over immediately.”  
Remus arm tightened around his waist. The firmness could’ve hurt, but instead it comforted him, and made his heart swell with an overwhelming feeling of security. Regulus nodded frantically. The light tapping of his fingers on the wand in his pocket made James furrow his eyebrows.

“You’re handing that one to me,” he added. “And now piss off, quickly, he might change his mind.”

Regulus turned around at once and walked around the next corner, his head still hanging low and his shoulders hunched up. He was in a protecting mode – but what, Sirius wondered, did he feel the need to protect himself against? It wasn’t easy to admit, but the Death Eaters were definitely scaring the entire wizarding world, and he was part of them. He was safer than anyone else. So why by Merlin would he be scared? And why would he want to talk to Sirius, and then agree to all those conditions?

“James, you are going to take the map,” Remus decided. “You’ll have to warn us if someone approaches.”

“I’ve got it in my pocket.” James put his hand lightly on his hip, were their greatest treasure was safely stored under his cloak. Sirius’ jaw was tense. He stared straight forward with eyes that didn’t really see. The fresh memories were hard to block out; he could still feel the pain, the total humiliation.

“We got this,” Remus muttered. He took a deep breath and reached out slowly for Sirius’ hand. The other flinched at the touch, but then slowed down his steps and looked at Remus with sad, stormy eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbled, now reaching out himself for his boyfriend’s hand. “Just a little tense.”

Remus shook his head, squeezing Sirius’ cold hand just the slightest bit.

“You shouldn’t apologize,” he whispered so quietly that James, a few steps in front of them, could impossibly hear. “It’s okay to be scared.” Sirius didn’t reply, but he held Remus’ hand tighter. 

They had reached the empty classroom five minutes early. James took the parchment out of his pocket and made the map appear. Even Sirius, hadn’t he known what the magic words were, wouldn’t have caught them through the howling of the wind that came from outside, and he was standing barely a meter away, now holding on to Remus for dear life. 

“There’s nobody in there,” he muttered to his friends after quickly checking. “Regulus is coming towards us, alone. You two go in, I’ll stay here and confiscate his wand.”

The classroom was old. Every visible surface was covered in dust. The window hadn’t been cleaned in years, maybe centuries. The darkness in the room was unsettling, it made Sirius squirm uneasily. Remus found a few candles that were still on the walls from the last teacher that had used this deserted classroom, and lit them with fire from his wand. The furniture and weird, undefinable things everywhere threw long, bizarre shadows, but at least it was possible to see now.

“Your wand.” James’ enraged voice from outside provoked a panicky feeling in both Sirius and Remus. Regulus was there, Regulus was outside this very room. They hurried to get into a position that was near enough to the door, so that Regulus wouldn’t be able to block it. Sirius ruffled his air with a shaking hand. He froze when the door opened.  
Regulus’ footsteps were hesitant. He was clenching his cloak with his hands, his knuckles white from the effort. When he looked up, directly staring at Sirius’, his eyes were empty. There was no sign of the seething fire that Sirius had had to see in his brother’s eyes since the age of eleven, neither was there the admiration and brotherly love from when they had been children. Regulus’ eyes were still grey, but all life had been stolen from them.

“I shouldn’t be saying this, and if he ever discovers, I’ll be dead,” Regulus began after long moments of deafening silence, stumbling over his own words. “First of all I want to say sorry. I know that sorry is far from enough, but I can’t… I don’t know how… What I’ve done is unforgivable. You’ll never be able to forgive me, I know that and I won’t ask it from you. All I ask is for you to understand that I’ll never forgive myself, too.”

He paused and drew a shaky breath. The dim light made the shadows under his eyes seem even darker. A sharp pain pierced through Sirius’ insides. He still somehow cared about his brother, who was now helpless and had been drained by his own wrong choices. Sirius was exhausted, too. He had chosen the difficult path right from the beginning, and he had lost his family when he had followed his beliefs. His life wasn’t any simpler than Regulus’. But his life was hard.

“I can’t just stop. I can’t just get out. It’s the only purpose in life I’ve left. I’m nothing when I’m not a Death Eater. I need someone to follow, and when you were no longer there, I had to follow our parents. I don’t say that it’s your fault. You have done the right thing. But I was too weak to do what was right. I’m too weak now. I can’t just – it’s impossible. They would kill me, and it would be useless. But I will try. Voldemort has done horrible things. They’re not imaginable, they’re worse than all the murder he’s committed. He’s so powerful.”

Regulus flinched at a thumping noise from above. There were people on third floor, they were surrounded by people, but the dusty classroom made everything outside seem unreal. It was another world, another universe. Regulus stood in front of them, vulnerable. He hadn’t stopped fixing Sirius’ eyes with his for a second. Was he even blinking?

“I just wanted to say that I’ve never forgotten that you’re my brother,” the Slytherin whispered. His voice broke, barely audible now. The emptiness in his soul didn’t let him cry, the last few years had stolen every emotion but fear and anger from him. “And I will now try to change something. I’ll try to act like you would, but I can’t promise you that I will. I won’t be there anymore for Christmas, I’ll leave. School is no longer important to me. I will die soon, and if not, I’ll spend the rest of my life in Askaban. I... Good bye, Sirius. I hope that when all of this is over, you’ll have a good life.”

Anger and sadness were boiling inside of Sirius, trying to get out, trying to make him scream and cry and punch something. He clenched his jaw, biting his lip until it hurt, and resisted the urge. His heavy breaths were clearly audible in the dead silence. Regulus’ breaths hitched, breaking and quiet. They were fixing each other, both trying to say unspeakable things that were too intense for words. Apologies and reproaches, anger and pain, pride and fears.

Sirius’ sudden urge forward broke the silence abruptly. He pulled his right hand out of Remus’ and punched Regulus right in the face. Regulus’ nose broke under his fist with a crack, blood starting to run out of it. Sirius smiled bitterly, satisfied.

“You deserved that one,” he said. Regulus nodded.

“I guess I deserved a lot more.” He held the left sleeve of his cloak up to his nose to stop it from bleeding. Then, he left without another word or another look, his feet dragging on the ground in defeat, his head hanging tiredly.

 

“Potter.” His voice was muffled from the blood and the cloak. His sincerity was painful. “It wasn’t me. But they didn’t suffer.”

“Take your wand and fuck off,” James pressed out aggressively. Regulus followed his orders, and it was only then that James joined his friends in the room. Sirius fell into Remus’ arms.

“I punched him,” he muttered disbelievingly. His voice was small and his hands were seeking comfort in Remus’ warmth and steadiness.

“And you were damn right,” James said. He leaned against an old, dusty table and sighed deeply.

“Everything could’ve been so different.” All the emotions that had gathered in Sirius were now breaking out as he was safe in Remus’ arms, overwhelming him. He closed his eyes, but the pictures in front of them mercilessly stayed the same.

“You did the right thing,” Remus whispered softly. He carefully stroked Sirius’ back. “There’s nothing you can change now. Come on, let’s get you out of here.”

“I feel like I’ve been on my broom for hours,” Sirius sighed. “I just want to sleep.”

“You can take a nap if you absolutely want to, but you’ll miss lunch in half an hour,” Remus chuckled. He supported Sirius on their way out, not letting go. The boy might seem so strong and stable but behind the proud façade that he had practically been born with, he was more vulnerable than most people thought. Remus was determined not to let him break.

“Food?”

“As much as you want to.”

“Me too,” James moaned. “And let’s go looking for Lily. They must’ve finished their girls’ time by now, no? You two lovebirds are making me sick, by Merlin’s dirty underwear!”

“I don’t give a damn,” Sirius commented. Remus blushed when Sirius’ lips touched his cheek ever so lightly. “This one’s mine.”

Regulus meanwhile stood over a white marble sink that was now coloured red from his blood, staring at the pathetic figure in the mirror. The light in the boys’ bathroom was blue, cold like his hands. It made his white button-down shine brightly, while the deep red stains on it seemed darker. His knuckles on the borders of the sink were as white as the walls, and the shadows under his eyes black like his hair. Like his heart. Like his name, and everything that was left of his identity. Black and hopeless.

He’d promised to change something, and he’d hold his promise. And if he’d die, at least he’d die for a better world, not for the terror. He was scared, but he deserved the pain.

“Do you think he’ll really change?” Sirius wondered, not really expecting an answer from his friends, not looking at them. His brother’s appearance, the utter look of desperation and hurt, kept flashing in front of his eyes, pulling at his heart. He hoped for it so much. Regulus was going to die, and with all the horrible things that he’d done, there was no way of claiming that he was innocent. He was, at sixteen years old, far from being innocent, and already condemned to death. If he changed, he’d at least die in peace. With everything that Sirius had already been through, peace had become the most important for him. He held onto Remus’ hand a little tighter. Remus was good; Remus was smiles, chocolate and cuddles; Remus was bright blue eyes and innocent words. Remus was peace.

And Regulus wasn’t.


	22. 22nd of December

“So you two are seriously telling us that you’ve actually never made Christmas cookies? It’s not even really Christmas without them!” Lily shook her head unbelievingly. The common room fireplace was warming up the grey, cold Tuesday afternoon, and somehow being inside always became cosier when the weather outside was frightful. Nevertheless, the Marauder’s weren’t exactly chilling. Lily jumped up from James’ lap, now staring at him and Sirius, who were on the couch. Remus had Sirius’ feet in his lap. He was smirking.

“I’ve, like, eaten them!” James pouted. He crossed his arms in front of his chest. “The house elves make great Christmas cookies.”

“But you need to make them, you need to fail them and to decorate them! What are you going to do when there’s no house elves? I’m not having house elves, that’s slavery,” Lily protested. She almost slapped James with her waving arms, which Remus was mildly concerned about, but James didn’t really seem to care.

“So you’re saying that we’ll live together? Yes!” He pulled her back onto his lap almost violently, crushing her in his arms. “Guys, did you hear that? I’ll live with Lily! But then you can do the baking, can’t you, Lils?”

“I’ve never…” Lily’s face became about as red as her hair. She quickly hid it in her head. “Anyways, I will never ever bake anything for you, that’s for sure!”

James put his hand on his heart dramatically, whining, and Lily quickly took her chance to get up again and get an armchair of her own.

“I do not socialize with people who have never made their own Christmas cookies,” she stated, taking her book from the small table next to her armchair that she had left there previously, and reading demonstratively. James leaned over and pulled at her arm, pouting, but she only crossed her legs and didn’t move an inch in his direction.

“Lily! For Merlin’s sake, if it’s that great, show us how to make them. And we’re not going to suck, are we, Sirius?”

Sirius just buried his face in his arms and shook his head.

“Why, James?” He moaned. “Why?”

“What if I asked you to bake some with me?” Remus asked innocently. He had to make an effort to suppress the laughter that was bubbling inside of him. Sirius murdered him with his stare. “It’s really a Christmas tradition. I used to do flour fights with my mother.”

“I used to do them with my sister when we were little,” Lily chuckled from behind her book, not looking at James at all. She directed her words directly at Remus. “My mom would always tell us off, but in the end she would be the one who was the most covered in flour.”

“Do you think baking in the Hogwarts kitchens is possible?” James was sitting on the absolute end of the couch, ready to jump up and unable to hold still now. Sirius, too, seemed a lot more awake than a few seconds ago.

“Asking won’t hurt,” he decided. Lily could barely put her book aside again before the two pure-blood wizards’ lazy asses had already left the common room. Remus was still in his seat, just laughing.

“Shall we follow the children?”

“How could you convince them so easily?” She complained, but nevertheless laughed along with Remus. They followed James and Sirius towards the kitchens. When they arrived, the other two were already in the kitchens at an empty, clean table, beaming.

“The house elves love us,” James explained, gesturing at the working space in front of them. “They’re totally smitten by our charm, they couldn’t deny us a single wish.”

“You wish,” Lily muttered, but her eyes shone as she looked at the cupboards of ingredients and baking utensils. “Okay, boys, listen.” Under her lead, everyone began gathering the ingredients (James and Sirius made sure that there was far more than enough flour on their table, while Remus kept looking at the chocolate fudge that a few of the small elves were preparing with gleaming eyes until they kept giving him bits of it), and mixing the dough.

“It needs to cool down a bit,” Lily announced when the dough was prepared. A few streaks of her hair had escaped from her high ponytail, dangling in her face, and her fingers were coated in dough. James took that announcement as an invitation to open up an entire new bag of flour and pour it all over Sirius’ head.

“You…” Sirius shrieked, shaking his head vigorously to get rid of the white powder in his hair. He caught some of it with his hands and smeared it directly into James’ face. James coughed, but while he was still blinking fast to be able to see again.

“My nerves,” Lily sighed. “The poor house elves.”

“They don’t seem to mind,” Remus pointed out, and really – some of the house elves were even laughing at the mess that James and Sirius were making. The entire floor around them was getting covered in flour, and they didn’t look any better themselves. “Want a piece of fudge?”  
Before Lily could even open her mouth to answer, she was suddenly hit by a white cloud of powder that made her cough and gasp for air.

“You idiots!” She screamed, launching herself into the battle immediately. Remus couldn’t help but join, too, and after merely seconds, all four of them were covered entirely in flour. When Lily finally screamed that it was enough and that the dough had chilled long enough, the kitchen was an utter mess.

“We’ll need to clean up. But first, get the dough. We’ll use these forms to cut out little figures like snowmen or angels or other stuff. And then they’ll need to get into the oven, but I will do that because I am decidedly the one with the most experience and the most mature person here. Apart from…”

“Me, “Remus supplied, smirking.

“The house elves.” Lily stuck her tongue out at him. “Now, get that dough rolled out! I thought you had such strong arms from Quidditch?”  
James was bright red in the face under the thick white layer. Their pale appearance made Lily wonder for a second whether seventeenth century people had maybe used flour as makeup, and she giggled into her hand. Then, she turned to Sirius, who was still trying to get the flour out of his normally black hair. He treated his hair better than most girls did. 

“You, go look for some decoration,” she commanded. “Or clean up the floor, it’s your choice.” Of course he went searching for decorations, and actually successfully. He presented her some edible glitter and sprinkles, and Remus had meanwhile found some icing sugar. Great.

“Can we start to cut them out now?” James begged. “I call dibs on the Santa Claus!”

Lily watched while they prepared the cookies like little children. Baking had been a good idea, and not only one that would do the boys some good (and open up their horizons, kitchens could actually be used), but also her. It finally felt like Christmas at Hogwarts. The decorations had been there for weeks, but that had been December, not Christmas. Christmas was family, baking, making presents and decorating, and she’d always mainly done those things by herself. The Hogwarts Christmas trees just didn’t have the same effect as a tree that she’d carefully selected and decorated with her own favourite ornaments.

When she joined the boys to decorate the baked cookies, and James put his flour-covered arm around her waist, pulling her close, she felt the warmth that she needed to feel around Christmas arising in her chest. He dunked his finger in icing sugar and left a dot right on the tip of her nose, kissing it off afterwards. Lily grinned and fell into his arms, kissing him back, but now on the sugary sweet lips. The cookies were quickly forgotten, but the Christmas spirit was there.

(Sirius and Remus were meanwhile competing in who did the better decorations, ignoring the sappy couple next to them. Remus was definitely better in finesse, and would surely state that his cookies were by far better. Sirius didn’t like to stick to the traditional colour scheme, using mainly purple and orange, and naturally claimed that creativity was the most important part of a good decoration. Either way they both won, and the cookies would be eaten anyways, so who even cared as long as they were having fun?)


	23. 23rd of December

Sirius woke up because he was gently shook by unfamiliar hands. Luckily he had slept in his own bed that night instead of cuddling up with Remus. The intruder in the darkness was no one less than head of Gryffindor house Minerva McGonagall.

“You have to wake up, Mr. Black, and go see the Headmaster immediately,” she whispered. Sirius turned groggily, and then quickly pulled his blanket up to his chin. The darkness in the dorm room was very fortunate. Professor McGonagall was wearing a flowery dressing gown and her hair hung loose. The boy frowned at her unusual untidy appearance. There had to be an urgency if she showed up in the boys’ dormitory in the middle of the night like this.

“I’ll be up in a second,” he croaked out, clearing his raspy throat from the hours of sleep. “Just need to put on clothes.”

“I’ll await you in the Gryffindor common room.” With that, she left the room. Their entire conversation had been whispered as quietly as possible, but the other boys in the dorm were, due to their regular transformation into Animagi, capable of hearing a lot better than average.

“What happened?” James asked as soon as the teacher had left. Sirius climbed out of his bed. He pulled some pants over his boxer shorts and a random button-up shirt that he found lying around on the floor over his naked torso. It belonged to Remus, but Sirius was only happy to have some support with him, so he took it nevertheless. Also, it was most likely to be stainless if Remus had worn it.

“I have no idea,” he muttered, rummaging around in the darkness. “Where’s my wand? And what time is it even?”

“On your bedside table, and like three in the morning,” Remus supplied. He had pulled open his curtains and now lit the tip of his wand. Sirius took his wand, and shook his head, his hair throwing dark shadows onto his face.

“I guess I’ll have to do this alone. I’ll see you later, guys.” Remus scrambled up from his bed, only wearing boxer shorts, and hugged Sirius quickly. Sirius breathed in his scent for a moment and smiled.

“Good luck.” Remus retreated unwillingly from the hug. He’d furrowed his brows, and was nibbling on his lower lip, but he let go and sat back down on his bed. “Come back alive, please.”

“I’ll try my best.” Sirius left, carefully shutting the door behind him. He climbed down the stairs into the common room with an uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach that made him feel nauseated. Professor McGonagall was really waiting for him by the portrait hole. She had used the time to tie her hair up into her usual knot, and didn’t smile at him. Sirius followed her through the building to Dumbledore’s office without a word. She uttered the password when they were standing in front of the Gargoyles, and gestured at him to mount the stairs inside.

“Mr. Black,” Dumbledore greeted. He wasn’t sitting behind his desk this time, but standing, and wearing a baby blue cloak that was meant for travelling. Sirius swallowed hard. Where were they going? He hadn’t taken a cloak, and it was really freezing outside. Besides, he definitely hadn’t slept enough. “I guess it is a bit early to say good morning. The Aurors have captured your father. They need you at the ministry to make a testimony against him right now, so they can lock him up in Azkaban. Are you ready to go?”

Sirius’ head spun. His father was getting sent to prison, and the person that the decision depended upon was him? He’d be dead as soon as he was no longer under the protection of Albus Dumbledore, but oh, that would so be worth it. But what should he say? He’d never told anyone but Remus the unspeakable things that his father had done to him, and would those even be enough for a lifelong condemnation in Azkaban?

“I haven’t brought anything, I haven’t even prepared anything!”

“You just need to tell them what has been done to you by your father. The Potters have informed me about you staying with them, and that you had a serious trauma. You did a good job at hiding everything, apparently, but don’t forget that they were Aurors. Reading people and finding out their secrets was their job. Being yourself and telling the truth will be enough, and I’ll be there to help you. We’re going to use the floo network.”

Dumbledore smiled comfortingly, and pointed to the fireplace in the corner of his office. He had already lit a fire. Sirius bit his lip, playing with his fingers nervously, but the decision was obvious. While he just wanted to forget everything and block out his family and everything that had to do with it, he’d never find peace.

“Okay,” he mumbled. “I’ll try.” Dumbledore’s eyes sparkled behind his glasses.

They entered the gigantic Ministry entrance hall a minute later. It was empty. Their footsteps echoed from the walls of stone and the high ceiling. A chilly breeze covered Sirius’ arms in goose bumps. The light from the magic candles on the walls was blue, and cold. Turning around and getting back into his dorm seemed like a good option from Sirius, but instead, he held his head higher followed Dumbledore with long, confident steps. Nobody had to notice that his knuckles had become white from how hard he was clenching Remus’ shirt.

They got into one of the waiting, empty elevators and Dumbledore pressed a button that made them descend. Sirius had been to the Ministry before, but this was nothing like it. There were no little paper planes flying around to deliver messages, and there was a deafening lack of noise. All that Sirius could listen to were the unsettling rattling of the elevator and his own uneven breath. The silence wasn’t helping with his nausea.

“We’re there,” Dumbledore announced when the elevator came to a halt and the doors creaked open. The corridor that they stepped into was darker than the entrance hall, and lined with closed, black doors. The Headmaster took the lead again, and Sirius followed silently. He didn’t dare to open his mouth, he feared that he might vomit right on the spot if he did.

“It’s this door.” Dumbledore finally stopped walking after an eternity and pointed out a door that looked exactly like the others. There weren’t even any numbers on them, but he would know for sure. He knocked, and the door opened itself immediately. Strapped onto a chair right in the middle of the big room, facing stands with a lot of people that were all wearing the same robes and the same expression on their faces, sat Orion Black. Sirius’ breath hitched.

“I, Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts, present to you Mr. Sirius Black, son to the accused Orion Black. He has got a testimony to make.” Dumbledore’s voice was clear and loud, filling out the room up to the high ceiling and not leaving any room for contradiction. Orion Black’s head shot around. He fixed his son with a loathing stare, spitting out in his direction. Sirius flinched unwillingly. This very moment, he contemplated turning around and running away from everything and everyone, but the heavy door fell shut with a thumping noise behind them. He was trapped.

“Mr. Sirius Black may mount into the witness stand,” the chief judge answered just as clearly. The absurdity of the situation hit Sirius only when he was walking up the few steps to the witness stand. His entire body was shaking like mad, hot and cold at the same time, and he didn’t know whether he wanted to laugh or to cry.

“Mr. Orion Black is accused of the repeated use of dark magic, of working together with dark wizards and of domestic violence against his son, here present Mr. Sirius Black. The witness may make his testimony.”

Sirius cleared his throat. And he started to tell his story. He began in his early childhood, telling the court about occasional beating if he misbehaved, before he moved on to being sorted into Gryffindor and the hell that had been his summers from then on. He told them about the Death Eaters that he knew of, and that had frequented their house and his father’s office. He imagined that he was talking to Remus, imagined sitting on the Astronomy tower in the fort that he’d built, being secure in Remus’ tight embrace. The cold around him vanished in his mind, and the words flooded out of his mouth freely. He didn’t look at his father for a moment. He didn’t look at anyone, he wasn’t even there; distancing himself entirely from his body, he wrapped his soul in Remus’ protection, all while telling them everything. He told them about the unforgivable curse that his father had used on him. He told them about how he’d been raped, used down to the most intimate treasure.

When he had spoken the last sentence, he came back out of the clouds. The humid cold crept into his shirt, and his legs quivered from the pressure. He drew a shaky breath, and waited. The judges had listened attentively. A few looked shocked, outraged; others had remained indifferent. Dumbledore was just observing his student, not smiling, but still proud. The entire room was silent, until loud, high-pitched laughter evolved from the middle of the room. Orion Black was shaking in his seat.

“The boy is a liar,” he screamed. “This is an intrigue planned by Dumbledore! All lies! All lies!”

“I don’t think so, Mr. Black,” the chief judge said coldly. Though he had never raised his voice, it was clearly audible through the screaming. Sirius wasn’t able to hear any more of it. He didn’t move an inch from the witness stand, holding onto the podium for dear life, and tuned out everything that was said. He watched, though, watched his father’s face becoming bright red with anger as all of the judges without a single exception raised their hands, and knew that he had succeeded, that the final sentence was Azkaban. He felt the Dementors coming, the cold and the dread that filled the room and the simultaneous shiver that went through the crowd, announcing their arrival, and felt the worst pain, the deepest desperation he’d ever felt, but he also didn’t. All of it seemed to be far away, his body on the stand was nothing but an empty shell that he had been separated from long ago. If that hadn’t been the case, he would have fainted, so he was glad.

The Dementors took Orion Black away, their rattling breaths as excited as a soulless creature could get, and parted. Along with them, the tension fell and the cold lessened. Sirius released a breath that he’d been holding the entire time, feeling his limbs connect with the rest of his body again. Professor Dumbledore gestured at him to climb down the few steps, and, shaking, Sirius did.

“It’s over,” Dumbledore mumbled quietly. “You have exceeded my expectations; that was perfect.”

“Do I get an O in “Getting father locked away”?” Sirius joked half-heartedly. His voice was breathy from the effort and the pressure that got lifted from his shoulders and his heart. Dumbledore chuckled.

“First of all, you get to join your friends for breakfast. Shall we return to Hogwarts?” Sirius nodded. The relief was still flooding through his veins, the realization of his freedom hadn’t fully hit him. He could now make peace with his father trauma. He could make peace with the Regulus affair. What was Christmas, if not peace? His stomach grumbled.

“That would be lovely.”

Joining Remus, James and Lily at the Gryffindor table, Sirius checked the Slytherin table while hugging his friends, especially Remus, and soaking up some of their warmth. Regulus had left.


	24. Christmas Eve

“We wish you a merry Christmas, we wish you a merry Christmas, we wish you a merry Christmas and a happy new year! We wish you a merry Christmas, we wish you a merry Christmas, we wish you a merry Christmas and a happy new year! We wish-“

“Stop!” Sirius groaned. He stuck his head out of Remus’ curtains and shot James a deadly glare. “Shut the damn thing of, James!”

“But it is Christmas,” James pouted. “Merry Christmas!” The bewitched Santa Claus toy in his hand was still singing its song with artificial cheer, but James had at least stopped dancing around in the room to it. Sirius threw a glance at Remus’ wristwatch on his bedside table, and sighed.

“It’s seven in the morning. There’s not even presents today! Why don’t you wait until tomorrow to wake us up early?” James finally found it appropriate to turn of the Santa (that had already started choking, a Santa too could only sing so long) and Remus pulled at Sirius’ waist to get him back into his arms.

“Mhm,” he mumbled. “Come back you’re warm.” Sirius grinned and leaned back down, pressing a soft kiss to Remus’ forehead. The smaller boy nuzzled his head into his neck, and hummed in satisfaction. Nevertheless, Sirius was awake now, and James as well. While Sirius could’ve rested in Remus’ arms and bed for ages, James became impatient quickly.

“So, are you getting up now?” He asked, pulling back the curtains of Remus’ four-poster. Immediately he shut them again, shrieking. “Why don’t you get up? There’s so much to do, and don’t discriminate Christmas Eve! This holiday is not about the presents.”

“We can do so much at nine in the morning, too, it’s not like we want to sleep until noon,” Sirius mumbled into Remus’ soft hair. “Go disturb Lily.”

James scoffed. He rummaged around in his clothes, and then a thump told them that he’d tried dressing himself but hadn’t succeeded. Finally he left the dorm and shut the door loudly. Remus sighed.

“What are we going to do today?” Sirius asked. “What does one do on Christmas Eve when they’re locked in this castle?”

“We could…” Remus yawned. His breath tickled Sirius’ neck, and he giggled, feeling silly and light. “Eat. There’s always food.”

“Sounds good.” His voice was raspy from sleep, and broke every few words. Remus tightened his grip around Sirius’ chest.

“We could also cuddle all day,” he suggested, dropping his voice and stroking Sirius’ back teasingly. Sirius grinned.

“I’d love to,” he answered. “If we could get food up here somehow.”

“You,” Remus laughed, distancing himself a bit, rubbing his sleepy eyes. “Am I not enough to you?”

“Am I allowed to eat you?” Sirius raised his eyebrows.

“If you want to?” Remus smiled innocently. Sirius coughed.

“Uhm,” he said awkwardly. His cheeks flushed and he started the impossible project of straightening his bed hair. “Uh…”

“It was a joke,” Remus said, pressing a kiss on Sirius’ forehead. “Bit early for stuff like that, isn’t it? Come on, let’s some breakfast.”

When they had finally managed to put on some decent clothes and managed to make their way down to breakfast, James and Lily were already there. The Great Hall seemed to be even more decorated for Christmas, and Dumbledore at the staff table had exchanged his normal hat for a Christmas bobble head.

“There isn’t even normal food today.” Remus shook his head in amazement. “There’s literally just cake and Christmas desserts.”

“It’sch great, ischn’t it?” James’ words were barely understandable through a mouth full of cake. It seemed to be red velvet. Lily shook her head, rolling her eyes.

“It’s been like that ever since we got here!” She complained. “You guys have taken forever, and I don’t even want to know what you’ve been up to.”

“We haven’t been up, actually.” Sirius winked. He reached for a piece of creamy cake himself. Lily covered her ears with her hands.

“I said that I don’t want to know!”

They spent their day all together, finally, mainly eating the leftovers from baking and playing cards and other games in the common room at their favourite table near the fireplace. Lily had insisted on them all wearing something Christmas-y, so James had pulled on his Christmas jumper (it was a bit too small actually, but nobody minded), Sirius had transformed a wizarding hat into a (rather weird) Christmas hat and Remus, lacking Christmas clothing, had gotten a little Christmas-y hair ribbon from Lily, who was wearing something similar along with a Christmas jumper and her natural appearance of red hair and green eyes that looked enough like Christmas all year long.

Around seven in the evening, they went down for Christmas Eve dinner in the Great Hall. There were quite a lot of students sitting at the tables. Although the house tables were gone as usually for Christmas dinner, there were still two tables left instead of the usual large one. They were both so packed with food that the wood was almost aching. They found a place that was not near any Slytherins, between some fifth-year Gryffindors and some sixth-year Ravenclaws that made neither snarky comments nor too much noise like the little students.

“This food is amazing,” Sirius sighed when he had gone through about half of his plate. “The house elves only get better and better, I feel like they’re taking cooking classes. Does Hogwarts pay them cooking classes? Where do house elves even learn to cook, and who teaches them? Are there, like, teachers amongst house elves?”

“Sirius.” Remus rolled his eyes fondly, putting down his fork. “By Merlin, how much have you drunk?”

“About one and a half cups… of pumpkin juice. I’m not drunk! I just wondered.” He pouted and went on eating. “It’s a good question, isn’t it?”

“Kinda,” James admitted. He was talking around food in his mouth again.

“Manners, James!” Lily scolded, slapping his arm.

“I’ve got too much muscle there, you can’t hurt me.” James stuck his tongue out at her, but at least he’d swallowed first. “I’m too hungry to stop eating and you won’t stop talking, so I’ve got to find a way to do both.”

“How are you even hungry,” Lily muttered to herself, but James didn’t listen to her anymore, he was far too focused on his food now.

“I’m really looking forward to Christmas dinner tomorrow, it must be even better than this,” Sirius sighed when he had pushed his plate away, not able to eat another bite. “Though I wonder how that’s possible.”

“The house elves,” James answered. “I told you! It’s all about them.”

“Guys,” Lily said suddenly, dropping her fork. It made a clear noise on her plate that made everyone look at her. “This is our last Christmas at Hogwarts.”

“But not our last Christmas together.” James put his arm around Lily’s shoulders. “As Lily and I are going to move in together after Hogwarts, you two are invited for next year.” He high-fived Sirius while Lily slapped him yet again.

“That’s not even…”

“We’ll be there,” Sirius interrupted her loudly. “Or we’ll have Christmas at our place. Think of the economy, Lily – it’s much better to live together.”

Lily just rolled her eyes, but in reality, she was happy that they were going to stay all together – apart from them and a few other friends that she had at Hogwarts, there weren’t loads of people in her life (sounded better than saying none) and Christmas alone seemed really, really depressing. She didn’t even want to think about it. And moving in with James seemed to go too quick, now, but there was still half a year to go after all and she just wasn’t used to being alone, having lived at Hogwarts for seven years.

(Also, James had to be taught some stuff. Cleaning, for example. Washing, too, and cooking, naturally. Someone had to be there to do it, no?)

When Christmas carols resounded came from the teachers’ corner of the table and almost everybody sang along, they all did, too. It sounded horrible, but it was Christmas, so nobody minded anyways and everybody sang along loudly. Maybe there had been some alcohol in the pumpkin juice after all – Lily certainly felt like it. It was quite a pleasant, buzzing feeling. A Christmas-y feeling. With her Christmas-y jumper. And the Christmas-y decorations. And Remus Christmas-y hair ribbon. Yeah, that one was the best of all anyways.


	25. Christmas

“Good morning,” Sirius whispered in Remus ear. “Wake up, Sleepyhead. We are waiting for you in the common room.” He stood crouched over his boyfriend’s bed, wearing pyjamas and his Christmas hat, and stroked Remus’ cheek gently. The smaller boy was still asleep, groaning unwillingly, but pulling Sirius’ hand closer. Sirius chuckled. He ruffled through Remus’ hair.

“Wake up, Moony, it’s Christmas and there’s presents. I love you, come on. Wake up.” He kissed Remus cheek, kissed his forehead.

“Love you too,” Remus mumbled. “Merry Christmas.”

“So that’s what I had to say to wake you up,” Sirius mused. “Now, come on. If it was for me you could stay like this, but for the others’ sake, pull on some clothes.”  
Remus yawned, and rubbed his eyes that were still half-closed. His cheeks were red from sleep (also from Sirius’ poking) and his hair was a total mess. Sirius wanted to wake up to this sight every single day for the rest of his life.

“Sometimes I think that you’re trying to sleep through the entire winter like a bear.” Sirius took Remus’ hand when the boy was finally fully clothed. He’d already had to catch the sleepyhead twice by now when he stumbled over his own limbs, threatening to fall over. “It’s cute how clumsy you get.”

Remus rolled his eyes at him while they were heading to the common room, but he failed to look really annoyed, yawning at the same time. Sirius laughed out loud. Lily and James were sitting on one of the couches in front of the fireplace, drinking Butterbeer (Remus wondered only briefly where the hell they had got that from, and didn’t even bother to think about alcohol in the morning – Christmas was only once a year after all) and laughing about something. The table in front of them had vanished under an immense pile of colourful presents.

“Morning, Moony!” James called out, raising his pint.

“Merry Christmas!” Lily added brightly. “Sit down and have a drink, we want to unwrap.”

“You impatient children,” Remus scolded. “I was fast asleep!”

“We were nice, sending Sirius to wake you up.” James smirked. “I would’ve just cast an Aguamenti on you, I bet Sirius was a bit more… gentle.” He grinned, wiggling his eyebrows so much that his glasses fell off and missed his drink only by millimetres. Lily scoffed.

“Great, and now that we’ve all been silly, presents.” She went to grab one of the most beautifully wrapped presents, with nametags on them, those that didn’t look like the wrapping paper could fall apart any moment, but Sirius was faster.

“I’ll give you mine first.” His voice shook from suppressed laughter as he handed her a present that was wrapped in a page of the daily prophet. The sloppy ribbon was made from a string of tinsel, one of those that hung around in the Christmas trees everywhere in the castle. Lily rolled her eyes at the packaging.

“Why are you laughing, Pads?” James asked, furrowing his eyebrows. He put his arm around Lily’s shoulders protectively, glaring at his best friend.

“It won’t hurt her,” Sirius said, grinning like mad, at the exact same moment that Lily shrieked. Her cheeks flushed bright red and she put the paper around the present again as soon as she’d seen it.

“Oh my god,” she breathed. “What the hell, Black?”

“Uh-oh, we’re back to last names,” Sirius muttered under his breath. He took a long sip of his Butterbeer, stretching the moment out as long as possible. “Don’t tell me you don’t like it, Evans, I know you’re lying.”

“What is it?” James snatched the parcel out of his girlfriend’s hand. He went almost as red as she when he saw what it was. Remus rolled his eyes, sipping at his drink himself to avoid going crazy in all the trouble that he had to endure directly after his peaceful sleep.

“Sirius, what have you done?”

“I thought they might want to use it,” Sirius smirked. “There’s a nice lacy one, I thought the colour would suit your hair and eyes just fabulously.”

“Don’t tell me you got her underwear.” Remus slapped his boyfriend hard on the arm. “By Merlin, Padfoot!”

“So what? At a moment they will use it, and they’re going to love me for it.” Sirius shrugged. “Let’s just move on to the next present.”

Lily put the underwear far, far away (she had to admit that the colour really was lovely and that Sirius, even though she didn’t understand that, had a fabulous taste in clothes, and, yes, underwear, too) and reached for one of her presents.

“I guess it’s only fair that I’ll give you yours.” She handed him a package that was wrapped in bright pink wrapping paper, grinning and taking drinking some of her beer. “I hope you will make great use of it.”

Sirius rolled his eyes. He put his half-empty pint aside and ripped it open quickly. There was a box in it, pink as well and smelling like roses and other sweet scents, with a nice purple ribbon on top of it. Sirius raised one eyebrow, sceptically.

“We haven’t had the same idea, Evans, have we?”

“Just open it, you git. I would’ve never given you underwear! This memory will haunt me my entire life.” She drank what was left from her Butterbeer in one go as if to show how serious she was, then put it down on the floor next to the couch.

Sirius loosened the ribbon and pulled it off the box. When he opened it and saw the contents, he broke into laughter. There was a shower gel, some face masks, some hair conditioner and some skin moisturizer – long story short, it was a beauty kit, flowery pink themed and obviously not intended for a seventeen year old boy.

“For princesses.” Lily grinned. “I’m glad you like it.”

“What does it make my hair smell like?” Sirius asked interestedly. “Oh, nice! Strawberry and vanilla.” He blew Lily an exxagerated kiss. “I love it. We absolutely have to do a beauty day soon.” Lily nodded, grinning.

“James, this one’s for you,” she announced, handing him a smaller, soft parcel in brown paper with a green ribbon. He took it eagerly and unwrapped it. The T-shirt inside was soft and Gryffindor-red. James smiled.

“Thanks, Lils.”

“Turn it around!” Lily commanded. James obeyed and gasped. He put a hand on his heart.

“Lily Evans! I am not a drama queen!”

“You’ve just proved my point.” Lily stuck her tongue out at him and placed a quick kiss on his cheek. “Admit it, you so are a drama queen. Remember last week when there was a spider on your shirt?”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” James pouted. “Next present! Here you go, all three of you. They’re kind of similar.” He threw them all a packet each.

“You’re so creative,” Remus scoffed. “And so careful, too!”

Sirius had already unwrapped his packet and was beaming. In his hands, he held a deep red jumper with golden letters on it. They spelled “Marauders” on the front, and “Padfoot” on the back. Remus was holding the same, the only difference being that his said “Moony” on the back. He was smiling just as brightly as Sirius. Lily’s eyes shone. Her jumper, too, had “Marauders” on the front, but “Lily” on the back.

“I’ve got the same,” James explained, pulling his out from behind his back. “You guys are my family.”

“This is brilliant,” Sirius said. “The Marauders’ Era isn’t over yet! Marauders for life!”

“Marauders for life,” Remus repeated, more quietly. He had to fight back some tears, and Lily didn’t look any better. “Thanks for being my family.”

“We’ll always be family,” James said. “You two are going to be the uncles when Lily and I get a child, just wait! And now, before we get all sentimental and before Lily starts hitting me, are there any presents left?”

Lily had indeed been planning to hit James – they weren’t thinking about kids, for Merlin’s sake! But then, she’d started thinking about a small boy with James’ hair and eyes like hers, running around in their big garden. She quickly pushed those thoughts away. It was far too early for a child – they’d been together for what, two weeks? (Technically almost six years, but oh well.) They were seventeen, they had yet to finish school and find a job and settle down and get used to adult responsibilities and – oh, she would absolutely love having a child. Her cheeks were heating up, so she quickly grabbed the last of her presents that were on the table and handed it to Remus.

“A book,” he commented after feeling the heavy parcel wrapped in brown paper. James was already sighing, but Lily shushed him and now managed to do what she hadn’t been able to before – slap him. Remus started unwrapping it, chuckling as he read the title. “How to make your boyfriend do what you want him to – this might come in handy. Fear me, Sirius!” He grinned. “Thanks, Lily.”

“You don’t even need that book,” Sirius mused, placing a quick kiss on Remus’ lips. “I’m far too gone for you anyways, I couldn’t resist your wishes if I wanted to. This is for you.”

Remus carefully (“Only Remus would be that careful with presents while there’s another one waiting,” James muttered) put his new book aside and took the next present out of Sirius’ hands. Yet again, it was wrapped in a daily prophet page, although it seemed that Sirius had spent a bit more time on wrapping this present than on Lily’s. When he had pulled the string of tingle and the paper aside, he discovered – sunglasses, and a box of Honeyduke chocolates.

“Those aren’t any sunglasses,” Sirius said. He’d sat up straighter on the couch, shifting his legs excitedly. “I got them from that weird Lovegood from Hufflepuff, those are moonglasses. They’re supposed to protect you from the moon.” Remus smiled brightly.

“I love them, and the chocolates are my favourite.” He put the dark glasses on. They made some of the softness in his features disappear, giving him a new, dangerous edge. Sirius gasped.

“Damn hot,” he mumbled. “Why don’t you always were sunglasses, Moony?”

“Because I can’t see a thing indoors?” Remus laughed. “But if you like them, Pads, I might wear them more often.” He’d taken to whispering in a low voice, and Sirius quickly had to turn off his imagination before it went places that it didn’t want it to go in front of everyone.

“Alright,” he stuttered. “Next present is for James. To make our last months at Hogwarts unforgettable.” He took a large bag from the table and handed it over to James.

“Zonko’s! I feel like at the end of this year, dear Minerva will just be glad that we’re gone. Thanks, mate.” The two of them high fived. Lily threw an interested glimpse inside the bag. Ever since they’d bought the glittery stuff and started to make plans for using it (Sirius had been extremely excited about it, claiming that the rainbows were exactly his colour), she’d somehow become interested in pranks, the stuff that she’d hated until barely weeks ago. It was fun, it made her and everyone else loosen up for a few minutes, it helped forget about all the bad in the world. 

“It’s just me who’s got presents left to give,” Remus realized when the excitement had faded a bit. He handed a carefully wrapped present to James at first, who ripped it open quickly and beamed at what he’d found. It was a little compass, the kind that could be attached to one’s broom.

“Thanks, Moony, amazing! Are you worried about me getting lost?”

“We all know that your orientation is shit, Prongs.” He smirked dryly. “It leads you wherever you want it to lead. If it’s seen Lily before, it can lead you to her – I thought that it might come in useful.”

“Thanks a lot,” James repeated. He squinted at the small needle. “Looks exquisite.”

“Where’s mine?” Sirius asked eagerly.

“He’ll give it to you later,” James joked. And Lily had to slap him yet again. “Fuck, Lily, at one point even I will get bruised, despite my muscles!”

“Maybe that’s my goal?” Lily blinked, innocence in person. Remus shook his head desperately. He reached out and gave a present to Lily.

“It looks like a book.” Sirius scrunched up his nose. “You two read enough books, you don’t need to offer each other books! And why don’t I get mine first?” He eyed the last present that was still on the table. There was wrapping paper spread everywhere around them, and empty pints of Butterbeer standing next to the couches. Their place in front of the fireplace was an absolute mess.

“It isn’t even a book, and you get yours last because you’ve been impatient,” Remus scolded. Lily meanwhile was unwrapping her present. She studied the golden album that had been inside with shining eyes and flicked through the empty pages carefully.

“It’s beautiful, thanks, Remus!”

“It’s for you to keep some pictures of the last months at Hogwarts and write down some memories,” Remus explained. “I’m glad that you like it.” And then, he handed Sirius the small parcel that was left.

Sirius unwrapped it carefully, not damaging the simple paper at all. He revealed a bracelet, made of leather and something silvery, that just screamed Sirius.

“It’s beautiful,” he said, scanning it carefully with sparkling eyes. “Thanks, Remus. I love it. I love you!”

“There’s something written on the inside,” Remus whispered so that the other two couldn’t hear. He was blushing, playing with his hands on his lap. “I planned on giving this to you long ago, but I’ve only added that when we got together. I love you, too.”

Sirius carefully read what Remus had magically carved into the materiel. “I will never let you go,” he whispered. “Believe me, I wouldn’t ever try to go – and same goes for you.” He kissed Remus, not just on the cheek this time, and they both got lost in the soft touch and the sparkling warmth, until Lily cleared her throat for the fifth time, so loud that some second-years on the opposite side of the common room flinched. Only then they broke apart.

“We’ve got a mess to clean up, and there should be lunch soon,” she said and got up, throwing some of the wrapping paper into the flames. “You lovebirds can do whatever you want when we’re not around and there are no children, but please at least keep it PG-rated in the common room!”

“Alright, Mum,” Sirius groaned. “Did I just hear lunch?”

“Only when you’ve cleaned up your room and washed your hands,” Lily joked, laughing.

“What have we done,” Sirius moaned. “We’ve created a Marauder monster!”

“No,” James mused, staring fondly at his girlfriend. “We’ve ensured another generation of Marauders! The Marauders’ Era will never be over!”

“Marauders forever,” Sirius chanted, slinging his arms around Remus and James and pulling Lily closer with his feet.

“Marauders forever!”

(They spent a wonderful Christmas with loads of fabulous food and the very best friends. They also spent wonderful holidays, doing nothing, talking or playing Christmas. They threw a party on New Year's Eve that Professor McGonagall had to end at four in the morning, and by that time the entire common room was covered in glitter. And what would happen to the Marauder family when the holidays were over was yet to come and not yet to worry about. There was only one thing they were sure of - whatever mountains they'd have to face, to climb or even to move - they'd to it together.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is it, this is the end!  
> I hope you all enjoyed it, and I hope you've spent a lovely Christmas.  
> There's also a silver lining to the ending - there will be a sequel!  
> So stay tuned to find out how the story goes on.  
> Lots of love!
> 
> Note: The sequel can now be found [here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5601274/chapters/12905716)


End file.
